Yugioh Spies: Dueling Drama Much Season 2 ON HIATUS
by Dakari-King Mykan
Summary: My OC Mykan and Sabrina's firstborn is kidnapped by rare hunters who work for the Ishtar Siblings who seek to breakup Mykan and Sabrina to have them for themselves, as well as steal rare cards to gain incredible power and skills, putting the whole world's economical structure in jeopardy. Mykan, Sabrina and the Spies must participate in a Duel Tournament to put everything right!
1. It's been a whole year

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_Just to be clear, Mykan is not a Self-Insert, he's an OC. He is not really me; he doesn't really act like me. He is just a fictional character with my penname. That is all._**

**CHAPTER ONE**

**_Beverly Hills Park, 3:00pm Friday…_**

My name is Mykan Jaden, world champion duelist, teacher of duel monsters and ancient Egyptian History, and private tutor and lifelong friend to Clover, Sam, and Alex for a whole ever since they helped me get my life back on track. Thanks to them, I was reunited with my love, Princess Sabrina Saffron, and we saved her father form an evil spirit… but maybe you already know that story.

As I said, a whole year had passed since then, and as promised, and though I was far away living on Duel Academy Island, I kept in close contact with the girls to continue our lessons and improvements with dueling as they were my apprentices, and they had become significantly skilled, and during the time added new cards to their decks, and it was seldom that they were challenged to any duels and lost… Mostly they were often challenged by Mandy, who was just as snooty and rude as ever, pining for revenge against the girls and me, but she always lost!

Still, for a little while the girls and I took a break from contacting each other, as I had my own life to lead on the island, what with my teaching job, my wife… _and something else a little special had recently happened to me._

The girls also had their own private lives to lead. They had graduated from Mali-U College, and were just enjoying life; shopping, ogling cute boys, typical girl things.

"Ooh… These new high-heel lavender-red boots are really dreamy." Clover said. "I'm sure to bag a few hotties with these."

"If they don't run away, or take advantage of you first." Alex joked. That really put a damper on Clover's fantasy. She still hadn't felt the same since she had gotten Blaine's last email, a full month ago, and she was really in need of a serious dating experience. Online dating was fine, but Clover was in need.

"At least you actually _have_ a boyfriend." said Sam "But if you were really committed to the long distance relationship business, you'd stop chasing after cute guys."

Clover ignored her, as usual, but just up along the park road, they saw me, sitting on a bench, and a baby carriage was behind the bench.

"It's Mykan!" cried Alex.

I heard her voice and saw the girls and waved to them. They couldn't seem to get over fast enough but as they got closer, their joyful voices seemed to get louder, and at the last few feet I told them "Shh…!" The girls halted right in their tracks and they all felt confused. "Not so loud! You'll wake her up." I said softly.

"Wake who up?" Sam asked in her normal volume, I hushed her to keep it down again, but the baby carriage behind me was trembling slightly followed by the sound of a mewling baby cry.

I rolled my eyes sighing softly and walked around to the carriage picking up a tiny baby girl, patting her back softly trying to hush her. "Oh, it's okay honey. It's okay."

The girls could hardly believe their sparkling eyes. "Is that what I think it is?" squeaked Clover. Alex held her hands together in a warm gesture. "Oh! Look at the little bitty baby." she cooed in a baby voice.

The baby quieted down, and looked at the girls making cute little expressions. "Is she yours?" Sam asked while gazing down at the baby, and I nodded. "Girls, I'd like you to meet my daughter; Erica Sabrina Saffron/Jaden. She was just born a few weeks ago, and I thought I'd bring her here to show her to you."

"How did you know we'd be here?" asked Alex. I gave her a look and pointed at the kerchief round my neck. The girls remembered I possessed the Millennium Necklace and could use it to see into the imminent future, making it easy to know where to be and what time. Still, the girls could hardly believe it, I was a father now, but it certainly explained why I had been so busy lately and didn't call the girls. They found it amazing that Sabrina and I had only been married for over a year and already we had a kid. "How is Sabrina?" asked Alex.

"She's perfectly fine." I answered "Better even since she's almost got her full-fledged medical license."

The girls were happy to hear that. It meant my wife would be a fully licensed doctor in almost no time, but still; little Erica. Just one look at her sweet little face was enough to make you forget about everything else with the world.

Clover couldn't control herself as the baby looked up at her and smiled and cooed. "Oh, you are just so cute! Yes you are!" she cooed and squeaked as she playful tickled Eric's tiny nose. "Uh… Clover, I wouldn't do that if I were you." I said.

"And why not…?" Clover said, but she suddenly got her answer as Erica's nose gave a little twitch and "Ah… Ah… Ah-Ah-Plech!" she sneezed all over Clover's hand. She screamed blue murder "EWW, all over my manicure!"

The baby just giggled at how funny Clover was acting, and as gross as it was, Sam, Alex and I couldn't help but laugh too. Clover's head was throbbing and steam was shooting through her ears, but she just couldn't stay mad at Erica.

Pretty soon I had to leave to catch my private flight back to the island, but I promised the girls I'd see them again soon, especially as I was very proud of how well their dueling skills were improved. We said our goodbyes, and I left with my baby to catch our bus to the airport.

"Mykan is so sweet." Sam said.

"He totally rocks." added Alex "I mean look at all he does."

"Well I know what I'd like to do; get my nails redone." Clover said. The others held in a laugh, but they as well as I were totally unaware of secret plotting being conjured.

…

Somewhere, in dark chamber, two sinister characters sat on thrones. One was a tall young lady with long dark hair, and beside her sat her younger brother who was slightly shorter than she was. They both wore dark robes complete with cloaks and hoods, almost like monks. A gaggle of people dressed in same outfits were crowded all around them, and each everyone one of them had a glowing mark of the millennium symbol on their foreheads, and a few more hooded people approached the two leaders and handed them two briefcases loaded with rare and extremely good dueling cards.

"You've done well." hissed the male leader "But none of these are the missing card we require!"

His sister agreed. "Our patience is growing thin. We want that card, and if we don't receive it soon…" She and her brother watch held up shining objects, which made the servants tremble with fear, not needing to hear the rest of it. They promised their masters the card they sought would be theirs soon once they found it.

After they left, the two siblings got up and walked over to a glass casing on a stone pillar, where two cards were facedown under the glass. "Once we have assembled all three special cards, there will be none who can stand in our way." hissed the sister

Her bother turned to her and nodded "And what our secondary goal, sister? Do we begin tonight?"

His sister nodded, and they gazed at two portraits hanging on the wall, one was of Sabrina, and the other was of me! The nasty siblings felt their cheeks going red at that thought of what they were about to do to me and my wife!

…It could only be bad news!


	2. The Hunt is on

**CHAPTER TWO**

**_Spies' Old Beach House; 8pm…_**

With their college days, the girls moved back into their old beach house. Clover got her manicure redone, and Alex was on the floor going through her dueling deck seeing if she could make any new changes, while Sam was studying in her textbooks, much to the others' dismay, after all this time she still preferred to be a bookworm. "Hey, I like to maintain a strong IQ." Sam said.

Clover and Alex strong disagreed and merely claimed it to be maintaining boredom. To be honest, all three of them were wondering what to do with college now behind them. They couldn't try to get super mega careers as long as they were spies, and all the long wait periods between missions, Clover never thought she'd say it "…but I'm actually wishing Jerry would just WOOHP us."

At that split second, they all fell through holes in the floor and slid down the WOOHP tunnel. "I think you just got your wish, Clover!" Alex screamed.

They continued to slide down the tunnel and landed with a thud onto the sofa in Jerry's office. "Hello, Super Spies. It's been a long time hasn't it."

Clover rubbed her sore bottom and wondered if she could retake back her wish for being WOOHPED. "So, Jer… what's happening?" asked Sam.

Jerry explained to the spies that businesses worldwide were being corrupted as their stocks and earnings were electronically vanishing, causing millions of people to lose their jobs and fall into total bankruptcy. "Whoa! Talk about breaking the bank." cried Alex.

"Precisely." said Jerry "I want you girls to find out who is doing this, and why, and find some way to stop them, or the entire world's economy will fall under the greatest disaster ever known."

"Worse than the stock market crash of 1929?" asked Sam.

"Far worse!" replied Jerry "And now for your gadgets; the wind-tunnel 9000 hairdryer, ultra sonic earring microphones, super handy drilling go-go boots… and our newest design, hot of the table, _the Trap-maker."_ The device was shaped like the Wind-tunnel 9000, but it worked with their Duel Monsters trap cards. "You simply insert one card into the indicator slot, so… and the device shall generate live versions of your traps."

The girls thought that was cool, and would really help them deal with bad guys easier. With that settled they changed into their spy-suits and were off to do some spying.

**_Duel-Academy isle, 6:30 PM..._**

It was dinnertime, and I really enjoyed this time of the night, getting to spend it with my new family. My father-in-law, King Wilhelm, really loved it as well, especially getting to watch Sabrina feed little Erica her bottle of formula. "Poor little thing, I guess she's had a day." he joked.

Sabrina and I agreed, but our gazes never left our daughter as she drank her bottle down. "Aw, what a good little girl you are." Sabrina cooed. The baby giggled and cooed, but suddenly, Sabrina looked all worried and felt a shiver run down her spine.

"Honey, what is it?" I asked.

"I don't know I just got this really weird feeling of something dangerous about to happen."

Her father and I dismissed it, insisting our millennium items would have warned us of any such dangers, we even looked on ahead but all we could see was everything seeming all quiet and blissful. Sabrina took our words for it, but she still felt that somewhere, something bad was going to happen.

After dinner, it was time to put the little baby to bed. I got the crib ready while Sabrina changed Erica's diaper and helped her into her fuzzy pink pajamas. We tucked her in and sweetly pecked her little head, and she went right to sleep. It was a sight that I just didn't seem to want to look away from. "She's so peaceful." I whispered so as not to wake her up. "It's so hard for me to look away from her."

"Really…?" Sabrina asked. "Well, I think I know what can take your mind off that."

"Oh? What?" I asked. My wife giggled, and motioned me to follow her. Ten minutes later, we were in our own bedroom right aside from the nursery, in our king-sized four-poster bed making love. "You seem better already." I said to her as I held her close. "I feel better too." she said as she lay peacefully in my arms and we both drifted off to sleep, unaware of the true events about to happen!

Two boats, each with five men dressed in those dark monk outfits were approaching the island completely undetected. They made it to the dark side of the island, which was usually unguarded and difficult to pass through and headed for the palace. Any guards that caught sight of them and tried to sound the alarm were immediately placed into a deep trance by a mysterious glowing light emitted from the markings on the strangers' foreheads. The strangers made their way to a side of the palace directly underneath the baby's room, gazing up at the high window and snickering sinisterly.

Using powerful grappling lines and climbing gear, they shimmied on up to the window and busted right in, making lots of noise and crashing sounds which woke the baby. She cried and squealed, and Sabrina and I stirred awake, but still half asleep. "What's going on?" I asked.

"What is it?" asked Sabrina, but the sounds of the cries and the crashes echoing through the walls quickly snapped us wide awake _"THE BABY!"_ we shouted. We dashed out of our room and found Wilhelm running down the hall, having been awoken by the sounds. "What's going on?" he asked. Not one of us knew, until we burst into the nursery to find the whole place ransacked, guards who had rushed to the scene were unconscious, the window busted wide open and Erica's crib tipped over and empty. There was no sign of her anywhere. "ERICA…!" Sabrina cried, and she fell to her knees sobbing hard.

I dashed to the window and found a note left by the creeps who did this. Such anger and sadness pierced through my soul that I just let it all out at once "NOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Meanwhile, those creeps had made a clean getaway in their boats with little Erica in possession. The baby's cries were really annoying they and they tried all they could to calm her down, but Erica only got more upset. Some of them felt like dumping her overboard and letting her drown, but they remembered what their masters had ordered and zoomed off into the night.

…

Meanwhile, the spies were checking out a place called _Chewy Choco- works, _in Los Angeles; one of the most successful chocolate factories in the world. Just licking one of their chocolates was worth a pair of new shoes and a matching dress to the girls. It wasn't among the list of businesses attacked, which suggested it would be next.

The spies flew in, and landed on the roof. "Okay girls, spy time." said Sam, they all used their ex-powders to disguise themselves as workers in the factory, and kept their earrings turned on. Just one look at the insides of the factory was enough to make Clover and Alex want to shriek when she saw all the rivers and machines loaded with chocolate. "This place is like a total heaven." Clover giggled. "Totally!" added Alex "I used to imagine whole lands like this when I was a kid."

"Try to stay focused." said Sam. "I have a feeling something's about to jump out any second."

Suddenly, the doors and windows of the factory were blown wide open, and several goons dressed in black robes, hoods and capes began to fill the plant and began ransacking everything, and hurt all the workers. The leader of the creeps made his way over to the computers and hacked into the systems holding the stock and paroles. "And the hunter catches his prey." he snickered

Suddenly, they spies leapt into the room, changed into their spy-suits, and the creeps all gazed at them. Alex threw a small vat of molasses at few of the creeps gumming them together. Three more came after Sam, and she rolled some round bonbons at their feet causing them to slip. Any of the creeps that made it through, Clover beat them up mercilessly.

The leader stopped his downloading of the money and faced the spies "What have we here?" he sneered "You dare stand up to the Rare Hunters? You will suffer for your interfering."

"Bring it on, tough guy." snapped Alex.

"GET THEM!" shouted the leader, and more of his hunters burst into the room surrounding the spies. Alex just grabbed Wind-tunnel 9000 to blow some of the men back, slamming them hard into the walls. Sam, using her supper go-go boots to kick more of them men over the railings and into the vats of gooey chocolate, "Guess it's true, paybacks are sweet like chocolate" she joked.

"Come on! Fight them!" growled the leader. "They're only a trio of girls."

The lasts of his men went after Clover, but she was preparing to give her newest gadget a whirl. She got out the trap-maker, and inserted a card from her deck, which she never left home without these days. She pulled the trigger and shouted **_"TRAP HOLE…!"_** and just as Jerry promised a big hole went right from under the goons' feet and they went through the floor. "Too cool!" she cried, and she continued to use other trap cards to help her, like **_REINFORCMENTS_** to boost her own physical strength to really do some damage, and **_NEGATE ATTACK _**to stop the creeps from hitting her.

As she continued to fight and use the cards to help her, the leader noticed this, and wondered _"Could she be a duelist with rare cards?"_ He decided to take a chance with her, and finally, when all his teammates were down and only he was left standing, Clover faced him. "Any last words, Bucko?" she snapped.

The man smiled wickedly under his hood, and pointed at Clover with his finger. "Yes…I challenge you to a game of Duel Monsters." he hissed. "What?" Clover snapped. The others heard that and were most confused "You want to duel, now?" asked Alex.

"No deal. We're taking you in right now." growled Sam.

"Wait!" snapped the leader "I'll make you a deal. If you can successfully defeat me, I'll come quietly, but should you fail, and not only will I guarantee you that I and my men will slip out of here without trouble, you will surrender the rarest card in your deck to me."

"What?!" snapped Clover "As if I'd do that."

"I see…" the leader chuckled "You are a coward."

Clover felt needles being poked at her pride "Say what?"

"You know that if you face me you will fail. I already know you will. You're the scared little fox running away from the hunter's wrath."

"Ah, eh…Fox?!" growled Clover. Her eyes were flaring with blazing flames. Sam and Alex tried to talk her out of it, but Clover decided to take this creep on to defend her honor. "No one calls me a scared little fox and gets away without a bruising or two. Get your game on!"

"Oh, boy!" sighed Alex. "This can't end well."

Sam agreed, but the leader, whoever he was snickered sinisterly. "The hunt now begins!"

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_In the duels, when you see a card's name with an UNDERLINE that means that card is from the anime/manga only (It isn't real… don't bother looking for it) And if you see a Card's name in (BRACKETS) It IS a real card, but I'm using it's anime effect, not its real one. (It makes the duel work out better)_**


	3. The Hunter's Cunning

_**Author's Notes:**_

_**As this fic was made in 2007, and is the second season I want the time zones and cards made from both series, and so… and real world to be held in respect. Therefore expect THESE conditions in the following duels...**_

_**- No Cards from 5Ds and Zexal allowed (They didn't exist then)**_  
_**-Only vintage cards from Yugioh (Eps 1-97)**_  
_**-Only GX cards from episode 1-52**_  
_**-Only cards in our world released within the respective years.**_

**CHAPTER THREE**

From their secret hideout, the two siblings were presented with little Erica, who had cried to herself to sleep, which the sister was planning to adopt as her own child. She never felt so happy and giddy before. "Congratulations, sister." her brother said with pride "Our plan is working."

His sister held the little bundle close to her, "And soon I shall have her father by my side as well, while you may do as you wish to his, soon to be ex-wife."

Her brother snickered at the thought, but he was snapped out of his trance when another rare hunter entered the chamber to deliver a message to the leaders, that one of their hunters, Seeker, was preparing to duel someone. The siblings did not wish to miss this, and the two objects they held glowed brightly allowing them to witness the duel through their hunter's eyes.

…

Seeker and Clover stood at opposite ends away from one another in a wide open area of the room, and Seeker was kind enough to lend Clover a duel disk from one of his fallen teammates to use for the match. Sam and Alex repeatedly tried to talk Clover out of it, but Clover insisted on going ahead. "I'm ready. Let's do this."

Seeker laughed at Clover. "I admire your courage, but I'm afraid all the bravery in the world won't save you from the hunter's sting. Let's begin."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 8000 VS Clover: 8000_**

With the scores already set, and the disks powered up, Sam and Alex decided to cheer Clover on, which she liked. "Okay, time to throw down. I summon **_ELEMENTAL HERO AVIAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 1000)_**

She ended her turn without playing any other cards, in hopes of luring her opponent into the open, but Seeker snickered and began his turn. "I shall set one monster in facedown defensive mode, and my turn is complete."

Clover and the others didn't understand why he did that. Avian was a weak monster. "What's the matter? Too scared to fight like a man?" Clover mocked, but Seeker snickered again. "I, afraid…? Certainly not, but soon you will be running scared from the hunter like the hunted. Make your move!"

"Whatever…" said Clover as she drew her next card, and liked it "Let's see how you like this, I activate **_POLYMERIZATION!_** Now I can fuse together Avain with Burstinatrix, to form **_ELEMENTAL HERO FLAME WINGMAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

Clover's new monster appeared and blazed in flames. She then ordered her monster attack, and destroyed the facedown, **_GIANT SOLDIER OF STONE_** with ease. "Ha! My monster was in defense mode, so my life points remain untouched." Seeker gloated.

"Actually, Flame Wingman has a special ability…" Clover said "When he destroys a monster, you take damage equal to the amount of attack points that monster had, and that's 1300."

Seeker gasped, and braced himself as the holographic flames enveloped him, and his score dropped.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 6700 VS Clover: 8000_**

Sam and Alex cheered for Clover, and she gave them a huge thumb up. "Now, I'll throw down a facedown and end my turn."

"Is that all, I was expecting more from you." Seeker mocked. Clover was really getting tired of all his taunting and hooting. "Will you just move so I can get back to smacking you?" she growled.

"…As you wish." Seeker hissed as he drew his next card. "I predict my card shall be Pot of Greed." And he played his card without even looking at it, surprising everyone that it was indeed Pot of Greed, allowing him to draw two more cards.

_"How did he know what card that was? He didn't even look at it." _Clover thought in her mind. _"Who is this guy, really?"_

Sam was wondering the same thing. "I don't think I really trust this guy."

"Ah, come on, Sammy. Clover's winning, and you can't argue with that." said Alex, and while she had a point, the duel still wasn't over, and Seeker liked what he drew a whole lot. "For my next move, I'll throw this monster in defensive mode, and I'll place one card face down on the field as well. That ends my turn."

"Again with the defense?" asked Clover "Um, ever heard of attacking?"

Seeker only chuckled "Eager to lose, are we? The hunter will strike when the time is right and not before."

Clover rolled her eyes, but drew her next card, and felt confident that her next plan would succeed. "Time to beef up my army some more... I activate **_FUSION RECOVERY. _**So now I can take back Avian and Polymerization from my graveyard, and… you guessed it, now I activate Polymerization to fuse my recovered Avian with Bubbleman, so I can create **_ELEMENTAL HERO MARINER!"_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

Now Clover had two super fused heroes by her side. Seeker didn't seem too thrilled though, but when Clover ordered Flame Wingman to attack the facedown monster, he laughed at her. "Sorry my dear, but I'm afraid **_SPIRIT REAPER_** cannot be destroyed in battle by any monster."

Clover was outraged that her attack failed, but she wasn't too worried. "I still have my Mariner, and get this, as long as I have face-downs in my spell-trap zone, he gets to go and attack you directly!"

Seeker gasped, and before he knew it, he got stuck hard again, and was dealt another 1400 points of damage.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 5300 VS Clover: 8000_**

"That was for calling me a fox earlier."

"You go girl! Clean his clocks off." cheered Alex. Clover turned and gave her another thumb up. "I'll end my turn by throwing down a facedown."

Seeker recovered from the attack. "Nice move, perhaps I underestimated you at the start, but don't think for one minute this means you've escaped the hunt." He prepared to draw his card, and played it again without even looking at it. "I play **_GRACEFUL CHARITY! _**Now I may draw three cards, and then discard two."

_"He did it again!"_ Sam snapped in her mind _"He didn't even look at that card yet he knew exactly what it was."_

"And now I'll reveal my facedown trap card, **_JAR OF GREED,_** so I may draw yet another card!"

Clover was most irritated. "Hello, getting bored over here. All you've done is play defenses and draw. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you have a pretty lame deck going on there."

Seeker snickered at that remark "Very well then, perhaps it's time I came out from the shadows and started to chase. I summon **_MUKA MUKA!"_**

**_(Atk: 600)_**

Clover was confused as why he played such a lame monster, only to find out that it gained 300 attack points for every card Seeker was holding. "Since I am holding six cards in my hand, my monsters attack increases by 1800, giving it 2400 attack points!"

"Whoa! Didn't see that coming!" cried Clover.

Sam and Alex felt shivers run down their spines, none of Clover's monsters were strong enough to take the hit from that beast. "Time for the hunter to pounce." Sneered Seeker "Go my monster!"

"Hold it right there!" snapped Clover "I activate my trap **_A HERO EMERGES…!"_**

"What's this?!" snarled Seeker. Now he was forced to pick a card from Clover's hand, and if it was monster, it would get summoned to the field, except… Clover was only holding one card. "You wanted to see my rarest card, and now here it comes; **_RED SPY-GIRL!"_**

**_(Atk: 2300)_**

The very card I had made especially for and given to Clover a year ago, and the only one of its kind. Seeker was amazed. He had never seen a card like this before, and he was more amazed at how strongly it looked like Clover herself. "So, you managed to summon your rarest monster, you still can't stop my attack!"

"Actually, I can…" snapped Clover "…thanks to my other facedown trap, **_HERO BARRIER! _**Since I've got Elemental Heroes in play, your attack is called off."

Seeker's attack was nullified, and he clenched his fists in anger. "My monsters are still impenetrable from your monster's attacks. They are no threat to me."

Clover drew her next card. "You know, you sure like to be wrong a lot…" she gloated. "Maybe I should show you my Spy girl's special ability."

Her Spy Girl's body glowed brightly as Clover paid half of her life points…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 5300 VS Clover: 4000_**

…and suddenly, all of Seeker's monsters shattered. "My monsters!" he shouted "You destroyed them all!"

"Ah, yeah…! Who's the fox now?" Clover cheered. "Of course, since I used her effect, Red Spy Girl can't attack… but you two can!" she shouted at Flame Wingman and Mariner and told them to go for it in a combo-attack on Seeker's life points, dealing him a whopping 3500 points of damage and almost knocked him off his feet.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 1800 VS Clover: 4000_**

Clover was just an unstoppable loudmouth of cheers. "Say my name! Say my name!" she chanted. Sam and Alex felt Clover's victory was assured, but Seeker drew his next card and laughed hysterically. "What's that freak so happy about?" asked Alex.

Seeker stood tall and proud and looked Clover dead in the eyes "You've done impressively well to make it this far my dear, but just as I knew form the very start, you were doomed to fail against me."

Clover blinked twice in extreme confusion. "Fail…? Me…? Um, hello, you're the one who's losing the duel here."

Seeker remained unfazed by her deduction. "You may have a good ideal of dueling, but you have much to learn about rare hunters like myself. I may be low on life points, but that doesn't mean I still can't pull through." He then revealed five of his seven cards to the girls and swiftly placed them on his disk, "I summon **_EXODIA, THE FORBIDDEN ONE!"_**

"WHAAAA-AT?!" shrieked Clover.

"No way!" cried Alex.

"Not Exodia?!" added Sam, but sure enough, the huge monster appeared in the eerie summoning. Clover was panicking to extreme anxiety trying to find some way out, but she knew just as well as the others there was nothing she could do. "I'm toast!" she cried.

Seeker snickered and ordered his final assault "Exodia… OBLITERATE!" and Exodia unleashed his extreme power, blasted Clover's monsters and all her life points to total nothingness.

**_FINAL-SCORE:_**

**_Seeker: 1800 VS Clover: "0000"_**

Clover screamed and held her arms up as the huge shockwaves blazed past her and knocking her far back and slamming her into a wall. All her cards scattered about with just a few left on the disk, including the spy girl card.

"Clover!" cried Sam as she and Alex dashed over to help her up. "Are you okay?" asked Alex. "Do I look okay to you?!" cried Clover "My hair, my nails, my EVERYTHING!"

Seeker stepped forth laughing at her, and worse all the other fallen hunters rose back up to their feet, much to the girls' horrors. "I told you, you were never a match for Me." hissed Seeker and explained to the spies how his entire deck was built to summoning Exodia while at the same time keeping his opponents stalled and himself safe. "No one has ever defeated my unstoppable strategy, and no one ever will, but that's beside the point. You lost our duel, and that entitles me to take your rarest card, the Red Spy Girl."

Clover grabbed her card and held it with pride. "Forget it! Deal's off!"

"Fool! I didn't give you a choice!" The hunters surrounded the spies, and before the spies could retaliate, they suddenly felt their bodies freeze up. "What's… happening…!" groaned Sam.

"I… can't move!" cried Alex.

Before anything else happened, the girls were beaten up brutally, and Seeker snatched Clover's Red Spy Girl card, as well as the downloaded profits he stole from the factory's computer systems. "Once again, the mighty hunter seizes victory. My masters will be pleased. Farewell!" and he and his gang left the building, and the spies felt they could move again, but they felt really horrible after all that especially Clover. "No!" she groaned weakly "My Red Spy Girl…!" She felt like bursting into tears. It felt as if she had lost a part of herself with her card.

"There's nothing we can do right now, Clover." said Sam.

"We better get back to WOOHP." Alex suggested "Jerry's never going to believe this."


	4. Tournament Preparations

**CHAPTER FOUR**

The Seeker and his rare hunters reported back to their masters to tell them of their victory, but the masters were already aware of it. However, they seemed more disappointed than pleased. "I don't understand. I won! I seized a rare card." said Seeker.

"Yes, you did." said the brother "However, my sister and I could see through to the other girls who were with the one you defeated, and they have identical rare spy cards as he one you took."

Seeker gasped softly, and realized he could have beaten Sam and Alex and taken their cards as well. "Forgive me, Masters, but you understand I was in a hurry."

"Silence!" shouted the sister "There will still be yet _another chance_ for you to make up for this blunder. Do not disappoint us again."

…

Meanwhile, at Mandy's house, Poor Mandy was sitting in her room sulking angrily.

She too had graduated from Mali-U just like the spies did, only with very low marks, no prestigious job offers or privileges. Her mother was very disappointed in her and made her take extra, yet private home schooling courses to help boost her status, to which bored her to death.

Other times, while she wasn't shopping or dating, she spent her time dueling, and despite her nasty attitude she was still a fairly excellent player and crushed every opponent in her path, but still crushing all those "Losers" and "Wanabees" as she put them didn't put her spirits right, and she already knew why. It was because of me, and the girls; the way we constantly clobbered her in every duel since I defeated her at Mali-U. Mandy wanted nothing more than to get revenge on me, Clover, Sam and Alex for humiliating her, but no matter how hard she tried, and the many times she restacked her deck, she just couldn't win!

The real reason was that she refused to acknowledge her selfish and obnoxious attitude; playing only for power and glory instead of dueling with honor and respect. She merely dismissed it was because the girls had powerful, super rare cards, like those spy girls I made for them.

Mandy angrily threw her pillow at her the wall and growled. "If only I had a super rare card like that, maybe even more, I'd show those dweebos who deserves to be the strongest."

She was snapped out of her trance by her mother coming in and telling to go get the mail which she was told to do so hours ago. "But mom…!"

"Don't _"but mom" _me young lady. Now go."

Mandy did as she was told, grumbling angry to herself, and she found a letter from her father who was working overseas. It read how he missed her, and knew she was feeling a bit low in the chops about duel monsters and stuff, but he told about a tournament he had heard of that was soon to begin and suggested she enter it.

In addition, there was a single dueling card enclosed with the letter, and Mandy's father had written that some of his men he sponsored for an archeological dig had found it and he thought she should have it, to give her deck a much needed boost.

Mandy had never seen any card like this before, not even in the official book of cards, and yet, after reading its effects she felt a nasty, wicked smile come onto her face when she thought of all the possibilities and the hope that this was what she had been waiting for, and she decided to test it out by entering the tournament she heard of.

…

Meanwhile, the spies got back to WOOHP, and Jerry was indeed shocked to hear of the events that happened, and felt especially sorry for Clover losing her card, but he felt just the same as Alex and Sam did. "You should never have agreed to that match, Clover."

"Yeah, yeah, I've heard it enough!" Clover barked. Jerry winced as if he had come face-to-face with a cobra. Clover apologized, but she was really peeved; losing her card, and getting beat up by those thugs!

"I still wonder who they are, and what do they want." said Sam.

"I want to know how they were able to freeze us up like that." said Alex "It felt like… like… magic."

Sam looked at the computer images of the rare hunters, and suddenly realized the markings on the hunter's foreheads. "That's the mark of the millennium items!" The others realized she was right, and they thought maybe I would know something about this. "We've got to call Mykan, now." said Alex.

Since I was an honorary WOOHP agent, Jerry contacted me and Sabrina by video phone, and they caught us as a very bad moment. Sabrina looked as if she had been sobbing for hours, which she had, and I told the gang why, and you can bet, they didn't know how much more devastation they could take. "How could they just kidnap a sweet little baby?" Alex cried trying not to sob.

_"That's not all they took." _I said _"We found a few of our card storage lockers broken into and cleared out. A great of rare and newer cards missing- We found all the guards unconscious, and this was defiantly the work of millennium magic."_

This case was getting more and more serious than ever. "Can't you use your items to look into the past or future?" asked Sam.

King Wilhelm shook his head _"We've tried, but whoever did this is somehow blocking us from seeing those events, and what's worse. We couldn't even see this coming or why."_

Sabrina, trying her best to keep her head, showed the spies the note that was left behind when Erica was taken away. It read:

_If you ever want to see your precious baby again, you'll both participate in our dueling tournament that will begin, but you can make it easier and surrender yourselves immediately to us._

_PS: If you have the rare card we seek, be sure to bring it with you._

_Signed: The Rare Hunters_

"Okay, will someone clue me in as to who these Rare Hunter dudes are?" asked Clover. The others all wanted to know this as well, and so I decided to tell them the story; it dated all the way back to Ancient Egypt, in the days when Duel Monsters were real and such, but not having been the girls' college teacher all that long, we never got to that subject.

The Rare Hunters: They were, in ancient times, a band of thieves who made a living by stealing valuable treasures, weapons, anything rare and powerful they took a liking too, and would sell them to high bidders to get rich and smite their enemies. These power hungry mongers were eventually caught up with and executed by good kings.

However, in modern days, The Rare Hunters relate more to the duel monsters card game. They specialize in rare and powerful cards which they steal or accumulate from others and sell them on the black market or to high bidders. However, they keep the strongest cards for themselves to build extremely powerful decks, rendering themselves seemingly unstoppable.

…even still, that didn't explain a thing as to why they were robbing business of money, but it was obvious the work of whoever was behind the millennium magic. "So they're being controlled by someone who has a millennium item." said Sam "This sounds almost exactly like what happened last year. You know, when we freed the King form that evil monster." added Alex.

Wilhelm didn't like being reminded of it, but it seemed pretty obvious the best and only way to truly figure this out was to enter the dueling tournament the Rare Hunters were throwing. Sabrina and I were both going to get Erica back.

"You can count me in too." said Clover "I owe these guys one for taking my card from me, and I'm not going to rest until I get it back."

Alex wanted in too. "No one beats on my friends and gets away with it."

"If you're going, then I'm going too!" said Sam.

I was very happy to hear them say that. Jerry almost felt like crying. "Never have I seen a more charismatic demonstration of friendship and honor."

Wilhelm wanted to join too, but felt he had to stay behind to help clean up the messes left around the palace, as well as be ready of the Rare Hunters dared to strike again and grab anymore cards.

So it was decided, the girls would sign up for the tournament, and we're all in this together now; to save my baby, and the world from financial collapse.

…

The tournament was conveniently going to be held in Beverly Hills city, practically every duelist in town wanted to sign up, but tonight was the last night to sign up. People could sign up for the tournament online, and those who didn't possess duel disks of their own would be given one on the day of the tournament after entry.

The girls stayed up half the night going over the rules of the tournament, and everything seemed pretty much straight forward, and the first place prize for the tournament was ten million dollars, and then it went on down. Second place would receive five million, and third place received three million.

As much as the girls thought that cool, they had a feeling that money was probably from the amounts stolen, but it was defiantly a surefire way to attract duelists to signing up.

There was, however, one thing bothering everyone. There was a new _ante rule,_ whereas the loser of each duel would be forced to hand over their rarest card in their decks to the winner.

"That is totally bogus!" growled Alex.

"We should've expected this. After all it's the Rare Hunter's tournament." said Sam.

"Great, now we just may even lose more cards?" whined Clover.

The girls really took some time to think about it now. They already had lost one rare card and didn't know if it was worth the risk to lose more, but suddenly they remembered that the fate of the world was on the line, and they promised to help me and Sabrina get Erica back. So they decided, no turning back! Besides, Clover couldn't wait for a chance to find Seeker and make him regret messing with her.

So they signed up, and received an immediate answer they were invited to participate, and were instructed to print out the signs of approval to present at the registration. Then, over the next two days, the girls devoted their every waking spare second to stacking and restacking their decks, and even bought a few new booster packs to help them.

Sabrina and I were doing the same. We even had warm up duels between each other and her father dueled with us too to keep us going. However, I decided that I would have to leave own Exodia set behind. I couldn't let the Rare Hunters get them by their ante rule, and they were also cluttering my deck with the new cards I stacked. On top of it all, what good was it if I kept relying on Exodia to win my duels? The whole point of duel monsters was experimenting and practicing with many strategies.

This left my Dark Magician, my favorite card as my rarest and most valuable. As much as it pained me for risking it in my upcoming duels, it was well worth the risk for any hopes of getting Erica back and finding who was behind all this madness.


	5. Let the Tournament Begin

**CHAPTER FIVE**

Soon, the big day arrived. Tons of duelists arrived in which was nicknamed _"Duel City"_ that morning. The promise of prize money sure attracted a lot of duelists. The spies arrived early for their registration, and they already had duel disks, but in addition, they and everyone also received, what appeared to be fragments of some kind of clear, see-through card, but not a single person knew what it was for. "I think it's some kind of puzzle." Sam suggested as she noted her piece looked different than Alex and Clover's, but there was still nothing to tell what it was.

While things were still just setting up, the girls looked all around trying to find me or Sabrina, but it was hard to spot us through such a big crowd, especially when the girls got easily distracted by all the cute boys they saw roaming about. Clover even tried to woo a couple of them, but they got freaked out and ran away, which really upset her. "First  
I lost my card, and now I can't even snag a cute boy. Could my life get any worse?"

"Well, well, what have we here?" hissed a voice Clover hoped she hadn't really heard, but sure enough "Ugh… Mandy! What are you doing here?"

Mandy simply scoffed "The real question is… What are you losers doing here?"

"Duh…! We're completing in this tournament." sneered Alex.

"Well, then I guess this is my lucky day." Mandy mocked "I'll get to have the privilege of knocking all three out you out of here."

"Oh, please, Mandy…" scoffed Sam "Every time we duel you, you always wind up flat on the ground and humiliated."

Mandy felt her forehead throbbing with anger. "You just got lucky… only this year, I've got a little secret weapon that's going to wipe the floor with all of you!" she laughed with her trademark snigger, and the girls were starting to lose their patience. "Forget her…" said Sam "Let's just go and find Mykan." The others agreed and left Mandy on her own, but when she heard that I was competing in this tournament too she nearly lost control of herself. "Well… if Mykan's going to be here, maybe I should think about taking him out first!" She reached into her deck and pulled out her single newest card "With this little baby by my side, I'll finally get my revenge and the respect I deserve!"

…

Sabrina and I had already arrived in Duel City, and were searching for the girls, I tried to use my Millennium Necklace to locate them, but it wouldn't work. That same force was blocking me from doing that, which confirmed we were defiantly up against someone using millennium magic, but we still didn't know who it was and why they were doing this.

"We'll have to try and find the girls ourselves." Sabrina suggested.

"Right, but let's stick together." I said "I have a feeling there's more to this tournament than meets the eye."

Just as we were about to walk out, a large zeppelin was hovering over the city. Everyone gazed up at it. On the sides of the zeppelin were large screens showing images of two hooded figures dressed just like the rare hunters, but were obviously the leaders of them all. No one could see their faces hidden under those dark hoods, but they were indeed the hosts of the entire tournament. As they gave their opening speeches and welcomed everyone… but Sabrina and I couldn't help but feel those voices sounded very familiar to us.

The two siblings finished with their opening speeches, and went over the rules of the tournament, including their favorite one; the ante rule of losing your rarest card if you lost, but also they explained what the fragments were we had…

They were one piece of six pieces that made a complete and fully functioning keycard. They were what we had to wager in duels until we accumulated all six correct pieces to form a complete keycard. Once complete, and when placed on a duel disk, the card would guide us to the location where the finals would take place, and the keycard was also to be presented as total proof of qualification.

Only a total of eight finalists were allowed entry, but the finals were a long way away, and most duelists would be kicked out long before then. The hosts wished us all good luck. _"Especially to two duelists out there we eagerly hope to see soon." _They hissed, and that was all.

Sabrina and I clenched our fists in anger knowing we had found the ones who obviously kidnapped our daughter. Entering the tournament certainly proved its advantage, but we had to move on to gather more clues, and find the girls.

…

"Okay, that was just plain creepy." said Clover.

"And it makes things more complicated." said Sam. She was referring to the keycard fragments. They each had only one, and this made it hard to figure who to duel. What if the opponents they faced didn't have the correct fragments they needed, and it also meant that even they didn't they could still snag the ones the girls had to ensure they couldn't go to the finals.

"Well, we're not going to get anywhere just by standing around here." said Alex, and the girls agreed to get a move on. They still had to find me and Sabrina too.

While the entire city was bustling about with people walking about and the police directing traffic divers to take the detours to keep out of the dueling zones, rare hunters were scattered about in the city eyeing the duelists. Among them was seeker as he sat outside of a coffee shop and gazed all around him. "So many duelists, so many rare cards, and yet so little time." he said to himself. "I wonder who I should stalk first…"

Suddenly, someone shouted right at him. "Hey, you…!" Seeker looked up and saw Clover staring at him. "Oh, it's you again. I thought I already taught you your lesson the other night."

"As if you taught me anything." growled Clover "But that's beside the point. You got my Red Spy Girl, and I want it back!"

Sam and Alex could see Clover was really fired up, and told her to take it easy, but Seeker merely scoffed at Clover and brushed her off. "I have no desire to duel you. I've already taken your rarest card. My hunt for you is over with!"

Clover felt her blood boiling and wasn't about to take no for an answer. "I said, we're going to duel and I'm going to get my Spy Girl back."

Suddenly, she heard a voice calling out to her and the others. "Clover, Sam, Alex!"

Seeker saw us coming. "That's Professor Mykan Jaden, and that must be his wife, the princess, Sabrina. They are the ones my masters seek."

"What's going on here?" asked Sabrina. Clover pointed at and explained about Seeker who beat her and took her Red Spy Girl card, "And he owes me one heck of a rematch so I can get it back."

Seeker merely scoffed at her. "I already told you, I will not face you. You have nothing that I want." He moved closer towards us and gazed at me "But perhaps your friend, Mykan would like the honor of being my next victim."

"Me?" I asked.

Seeker snickered "It will be my pleasure to face you, and snatch your rare Dark Magician card, and plus, my masters have promised a great and bountiful reward for any of us who can defeat you or your wife, Mykan. So I challenge you to a duel!"

Sam was confused "Why is he so eager to face Mykan and Sabrina?" she wondered aloud. Alex had the impression that it had to do with the hosts of tournament when they claimed to be eager to see two special duelists. "But why them?" she asked.

As for me, I stepped forward. "All right, Seeker. I accept your challenge."

"Mykan, no!" cried Clover. She tried to talk me out of it, but I wouldn't let her. "I have to do this, Clover. It's the only way to get back your Red Spy Girl, and for me to try and figure out what all this is about."

Seeker snickered and said "Let's get on with this hunt already. I grow hungry for your Dark Magician card."

I gazed at Sabrina and she pecked me on the cheek. "Good luck, darling." I nodded at her and turned to face Seeker. "All right, I'm ready whenever you are."

"Mykan, wait a minute!" cried Clover, but before she could continue, Seeker cut her out. "Uh, uh, uh…! Zip it, girly! Don't even think about revealing my strategy!" he cast a look at Sam and Alex "If either you or your friends utter so much as a single word of how I defeated you, I will take your precious Spy Girl card and tear it to pieces!"

The spies all gasped in horror at such thought. "Why, you dirty creep!" growled Sam.

"Yeah…! You can't pull a dirty trick on us like this!" added Alex. Nevertheless, I was still ready. Our disks were set and as were our life points. _"This is it…"_ I thought to myself _"I hope I can win this, for Clover, and for my daughter!"_

_"…DUEL!"_ we both shouted


	6. The Hunter or the Hunted

**CHAPTER SIX**

From their secret hideout, the leaders of the rare hunters could see all the duels being played, and thought it convenient that I was in the first match of the tournament, but the brother could hardly concentrate with baby Erica constantly crying her little head off. "Don't you ever stop that wretched crying?!" he snarled at her making her cry louder.

His sister disapproved of her brother's behavior and continuously tried to calm the baby down, but to no avail. "Please, hush, little one." She said as soothing as she could, but Eric only fussed about in her arms.

"Perhaps she misses her mother." said the brother.

"I am the child's mother now." growled the sister. "It will take time, but soon she will learn to accept that. Especially if Seeker wins this duel, I'll have more than just this child." She gazed at the monitor viewing my duel and she gazed right at me, and her cheeks went red under her hood. "Mykan…!"

…

Back in Duel City, a lot of people crowded around to watch the duel. Some of them even recognized me as the world famous champion duelist, Mandy was amongst them, and defiantly hoping I'd lose.

The score was set…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mykan: 8000 VS Seeker: 8000_**

"Let's begin this match." I said, eager to get started. We each drew our first cards, and Seeker really liked what got. He already had two Exodia pieces in his hand, and he thought sinisterly _"The way my deck is stacked to perfection, it won't be long before I gather five pieces to summon the unbeatable Exodia, and snare Mykan's Dark Magician away."_

"Here I come!" I shouted. "I'll start by placing one card face down on the field, and then I summon **_ALPHA THE MAGNET WARRIOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

"That ends my turn. Now, make your move, Seeker."

Seeker gazed at me snickering sinister, and the spies didn't like his gaze. "Be careful, Mykan." cried Alex. "Watch out for…"

"Silence!" snarled Seeker "I told you not to reveal my strategy or your friend's card is history! Now then, back to business. I shall activate the spell **_POT OF GREED! _**This lets me draw two new cards."

He drew his cards, and his grin widened as he said in his mind _"Perfect, the third piece of Exodia. I only need two more now." _He then spoke to me, taunting "If you only knew what was in my hand now, you'd surrender this duel and your Dark Magician to me now!"

"Never…!" I snapped "While it's true, I can't see what's in your hand, but I can prevent you from surprising me with my trap card, **_LIGHT OF INTERVENTION!"_** With my new continuous trap in play, neither of us would be allowed to set any monsters in facedown defense-mode, but Seeker didn't seem the least bit worried. "It'll take more than that to stop the hunter. For now, I play **_D.D TRAINER_** in defense-mode!"

**_(Def: 2000)_**

He ended his turn, but I began to have my suspicions about him. All he did was draw cards and play a strong defense. There was no doubt in my mind, he was waiting for something, but exactly what I didn't know, and with my Millennium Necklace blocked from showing me, and the spies forbidden to say a thing, I had to play cautiously.

Sabrina watched me bravely. "Stay strong, Mykan. I know you can win this."

The spies, however, were really losing their cool knowing fully well what Seeker was up to, but with Clover's Spy Girl card on the line they had to try and contain all urges to blab it out.

"It's my turn now!" I said as I drew my next card "I now sacrifice my magnet warrior and call upon my all powerful **_SUMMONED SKULL!"_**

**_(Atk: 2500)_**

I ordered my monster to attack, and Seeker's beast was crushed! "It looks like your little plan to defend against me didn't work, Seeker."

Seeker growled. "Now it's my turn… and I predict my draw will be Graceful Charity!" and sure enough, after he drew his card, he played it right away without even looking, Graceful Charity, just as he said. So he drew three cards, and then discarded two.

_"How did he know what card he'd draw without even looking at it? What is he up to?" _I wondered.

"And next…" hissed Seeker "I'll summon the impenetrable **_SPIRIT REAPER!"_**

**_(Def: 200)_**

"As powerful as your Summoned Skull is, it can't pierce through my new monster's defenses quite so easily."

He was right too. I knew Spirit Reaper couldn't be destroyed in battle, but that didn't make it totally invincible.

"Mykan, be careful." cried Clover "This is the same stuff he used on me when I dueled him. If you don't watch it he'll-"

"Silence, girly!" growled Seeker "One more peep, and say farewell to your Red Spy Girl."

Clover was really losing her cool now, and it was getting hard for me to concentrate. I drew my next card "For my next move, I'll lay this card facedown, and that will do it for me."

"That will do indeed, Mykan." hissed Seeker. He reached for his deck to draw and predicted he would draw Magical Mallet, and he was right, again! I just couldn't figure out how he did it.

"Thanks to my Magical Mallet spell, I am able to as many cards I don't need into my deck, then reshuffle and draw the same number of cards I discarded." After he completed his task and refreshed his cards he could feel his insides tingling with glee. Now he had four Exodia pieces in his hand, all he needed now was the fifth and final piece; the head of Exodia, The Forbidden One! His victory was becoming more and more assured, but in the meantime he decided to keep up his defenses more. "I'll set one of my own cards facedown and end my turn."

This was the third time in a row he played a move without making an effort to attack me. "You know, Seeker. For a hunter you sure spend a lot of time hiding behind defenses and secrets, but to win this duel you will have to attack me eventually. So what are you waiting for?"

Seeker chuckled at me and said "Patience, Mykan. The hunter will strike when the time comes and not before." while in his mind he said to himself _"As soon as I assemble all five pieces of Exodia will I be able to crush you, and with my cards coated with invisible ink, I can use my X-ray contact lens to see exactly what I'll draw next."_

He gazed down over his deck, and sure enough, his marked cards showed him his next draw was just what he needed, the head of Exodia. _"There's no way out for you this time, Mykan."_ he thought to himself.

Clover had taken enough. "Mykan, wait!"

"Clover, don't!" cried Sam, but Clover wouldn't wait. "Mykan, I'm not going to let you do this. I'm not letting you risk your Dark Magician anymore."

"Clover, please stop!" said Sabrina "Let Mykan duel on his own."

"Sabrina's right, Clover…" I said "Don't reveal his strategy to me. I will beat him and I will get you your Red Spy Girl back."

Clover tried to protest, but I wouldn't hear of it, and I reminded her of the time she and the others helped me last year. When I faced the evil spirit, Aswad, controlling Sabrina's father, not only did they help get that far and rescue Sabrina, but they were there to help me in the final duel, and just when I had given up all hope, they didn't give up on me and gave me the courage and strength I needed to stand up again. It was then that I was able to assemble all five pieces of Exodia and win the duel instantly.

"Don't you see, Clover?" I said to her "To me, Exodia represents a part of all of you to me. We're a team, and we've always been there for one another. You and the others helped me, and now I'm going to return the favor by helping you."

It was right then and that I suddenly began to catch on and put it all together. The way Seeker was drawing and putting up strong defenses. It all made perfect sense!_ "Exodia…! That's it! Seeker's stalling until he can draw all five pieces of Exodia."_

A big smirk appeared on my face. "I'm on to you, Seeker. I know what you're up to." I said to him. "You're planning to summon Exodia, The Forbidden One!"

Seeker couldn't believe "No! That's impossible! How did you guess that?"

The spies cheered for joy, and I turned and thanked them all. They managed to help me guess it without actually telling me. As outraged as Seeker was, he didn't seem to mind. "Impressive deductions, but just because you've discovered my strategy doesn't mean you've won, and don't think that you will either. Everyone knows that Exodia is called _Unstoppable_ for a reason."

He had a bit of a point, but I had a sneaky feeling of his one fatal flaw in the construction of his deck, but the first thing I had to do was stop him from getting the last Exodia piece. "It's my turn now." I said, and I drew my card. The corner of my eye shimmered hinting I drew something good, but for the moment I summoned one of my newer monsters to the field. **_"BETA THE MAGNET WARROR…!"_**

**_(Atk: 1700)_**

"And next, I'll activate this spell card, **_STOP DEFENSE!"_**

With it, I used it to turn the Spirit Reaper from defense to attack-mode! In doing so, since the Spirit Reaper was targeted by the effect of a spell card, it was instantly destroyed, leaving Seeker wide open. "All monsters have their own weak spot, Seeker. Now that you have no monsters to protect you, I'll attack your life points directly!" I ordered my two monsters to strike, and they dove straight for Seeker.

"Not so close…!" growled Seeker "I activate **_NEGATE ATTACK!"_**

"Oh, no…!" I cried as my attack was neutralized and my battle phase forced to an end. "No, Mykan!" cried Sabrina. "His attack's been canceled out!" added Sam.

Clover bit on her top collar nervously, and Sam was worried as ever, but Seeker was laughing with glee. "You fool; every good hunter always keeps a trick or two up his sleeve. Not only is my deck designed for summoning Exodia with ease, but it provides row after row of excellent defenses. Your time is up, Mykan. On my next turn, once I draw my next card, I'll not only score an automatic victory, but I'll take your Dark Magician just as I did Clover's Red Spy Girl. My masters will be extremely pleased." He laughed and cackled loudly.

The girls simply could not stand this and they were even dueling him, but I on the other hand was also laughing. "Hey…! What's so funny?" asked Seeker.

"You seem to have this duel all figured out, Seeker, but you forget that it's still my turn, and I can still stop you in your tracks."

"You can't!" growled Seeker.

"But I can…" I protested "And I'll do so by activating my trap, **_DISTURBANCE STRATEGY!"_**

Seeker gasped loud in shock. "No! Not that card!" It meant that he had to shuffle all the cards in his hand back into his deck and draw the same number of cards he had before. Thanks to my little stunt, he now only had two pieces of Exodia in his hand. The girls cheered for joy and such relief, they thought I was a goner.

"You see, Seeker. Exodia may be unstoppable, but only when he is fully assembled. Until then, the five cards that make him up are easy prey."

"Now it's my turn!" growled Seeker, and he drew his sixth card which was an Exodia piece, but he still required two more. "So you may have stalled me this time, Mykan, but I still have plenty of other ways to get what I want. Like this… **_LEVEL LIMIT- AREA B…!"_**

I gasped! That was a very powerful and continuous spell. As long as it remained in play, all monsters that had four stars or more in their level were instantly switched into defense-mode and their battle positions couldn't be changed. My Summoned Skull and Beta were stuck!

**_(Def: 1200)_**

**_(Def: 1600)_**

"Looks like you won't be able to deplete my life points so easily, Mykan, but I can do the same for you." hissed Seeker. "I summon **_MUKA MUKA…!"_**

**_(Atk: 600)_**

The same monster he used on Clover, and since he was hold four cards, its attack went up to 1800. Next thing, he crushed my Summoned Skull just like that. "You see, Mykan. Every good hunter always has some nasty surprise lying wait to surprise their victims, and you've fallen into a tight place. You can't attack me, or my monster, and I'll be free to continue drawing cards until I've assembled all five pieces of Exodia."

I grinned softly and scoffed "…But not soon enough."

"What do you mean…?"

"Your strategy involves relying solely on the power of a single monster, a very fatal and tragic flaw that can be easily overcome by a good duelist who uses the right balance of cards."

Seeker was starting to lose his patience with me, but he ignored my words insist that he was in the clear, but I remained unfazed and drew my next card. "I summon **_GAZELLE THE KING OF MYTHICAL BEASTS!"_**

**_(Def: 1200)_**

My monster had four stars so he instantly went into defense-mode, just as Seeker gloated at me. "This is almost too fun to handle. You really think you can intimidate me with such weak and feeble creatures."

"They may look weak, and many not be able to attack, but I promise you this Seeker, when monsters are let loose, you won't stand a chance. For now, I'll place two cards face-down and end my turn."

"Now it's my turn!" hissed Seeker. He didn't get an Exodia piece on his draw, as he spotted thanks to his cheating, but since he was holding another card, his Muka Muka's attack rose to 2100, and even still it was a card he knew could help him finally assemble all the pieces. "Hope you're ready to lose it all, Mykan. This next move will surely bring the end for you and all your hopes!"

I just stood where I was with my arms folded, secretly hoping for him to do something.

"Firstly, I'll have my Muka Muka destroy your magnet warrior!" he shouted, and his monster crushed mine with ease. "The hunter strikes with success, and now I'll place one card face down."

His facedown card was a trap, called Backup Soldier, and when he activated it, if he had at least five monsters in his graveyard, it would allow him to take three normal monsters and place them into his hand. "And now Mykan, allow me to return the favor you did to me some turns back, I activate **_CARD DESTRUCTION,_** and it forces us both to discard all the cards we hold and then draw new ones."

We both did so. I only discarded and drew two cards, while Seeker did four, and his plan was working. He got his last two Exodia pieces, and the other three were in his graveyard. _"Excellent…!" _he thought _"Everything is just as I planned. All I have to do is waiting until Mykan begins his next turn. Then I'll use my Backup Soldier trap card and regain the other three pieces of Exodia, giving me all five cards. Victory will be mine!"_

The girls didn't know how much more of this they could take. "You know, I especially hate it when that guy gets all cocky and grins like that." said Alex.

"You're telling me." added Sam "I'd say he's got one heck of a nasty surprise cooking up."

Clover hung her head low "Great! I guess that means I can kiss my Red Spy Girl card goodbye."

"No, you won't!" Sabrina said with glee in her voice. The girls turned to face her and wondered why she was acting so joyful, Sabrina pointed out at me and the way I was standing with a great big smile on my face. "I'd know that expression anywhere. Mykan has this won!"

The girls suddenly felt their hopes rising, but Seeker, having heard them, didn't understand. "How can they be acting so confident?" he asked me "Don't they realize that you're about to lose everything."

I opened my eyes and glared at him sinisterly "But I'm not about to lose, Seeker. You did exactly what I wanted you to do."

Seeker was confused, and I explained to him that knowing how desperate he was to summon Exodia quickly, he'd try a stunt like discarding. "Now, you've fallen into my trap, a costly mistake! Activate **_DISAPPEAR!"_**

"What's that trap?" Seeker asked sounding shocked. I gazed at him and explained "Disappear allows me to select one card in my opponent's graveyard and remove it from play!"

"Ah! Oh, no!" cried Seeker as he watched to his horror "Exodia's Right Arm…!" My card took it and shattered it right before his eyes completely devastating him. "The tables have turned on you, Seeker. The right arm has been removed from your grasp, and without it, you can no longer draw all five pieces into you hand to summon Exodia."

Seeker was totally speechless. "This is… impossible! You actually stopped the unstoppable Exodia!"

Unable to play anymore cards with what he had, he was forced to end his turn, which allowed me to spring my other facedown card on him. "I play, **_(MOSTER RECOVERY) _**Now, I can add all the cards in my hand and on the field to my hand, reshuffle and draw five new cards." Then when my turn actually began, I drew a sixth card, but as luck had it for me still, it was Pot of Greed which I played and drew two more cards for a grand total of seven. "Like I said, having to correct balance of cards can go a much better way."

First I used **_HEAVY STORM_** to destroy all spells and traps in play, shattering the Level Limit card and releasing me from its power. "Now I activate **_CHANGE OF HEART_**, Now I will control your monster."

"Oh, no!" cried Seeker as his Muka Muka, his only monster, came onto my side of the field. "Next, I'll sacrifice your monster, so I may call forth my **_BERFOMET!"_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

"With his appearance, I am able to bring Gazelle to my hand from my deck instantly! Now, I can play **_POLYMERIZATION, _**fusing Gazelle and Berfomet in order to create **_CHIMERA THE FLYING MYTHICAL BEAST!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

"And to add more to my assault I play **_MONSTER REBORN,_** to revive a monster that I previous discarded when you played Card Destruction; so, I special summon my **_DARK MAGICIAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 2500)_**

Seeker could not believe this was happening. All these cards, I was playing them so incredibly well. "This… this can't be happening!"

"Oh, but it is, and I'm not through yet…" I said "I'll equip my Dark Magician with the **_MAGIC FORMULA,_** to raise his attack power by 700!"

**_(Atk: 3200)_**

"Chimera… Dark Magician, attack the rare hunter now!"

Seeker screamed as my two monsters dove straight at him and dealt him so serious damage, 5300 points to be exact.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mykan: 8000 VS Seeker: 2700_**

I raised my last card up high, "And now, for my final move, I play from my hand the quick-play spell, **_DE-FUSION,_** which splits up my Chimera into the two original monsters I fused to form it."

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

Seeker looked up! "No!" but it was too late for him as I ordered both my monsters to attack and wipeout the rest of his life points and knocking him flat on the ground really hard, ending the match!

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mykan: 8000 VS Seeker: "0000"_**

"He did it!" cried Clover.

"Mykan won!" shriek Alex.

Sam and Sabrina rejoiced and hugged, and the rest of the crowd cheered for me. Mandy was really impressed that I defeated someone with Exodia, but it didn't matter to her. _"There's one card you won't beat, and I've got it, and when I crush you with it, it'll be all the more sweet."_

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_I apologize if Mykan's move seemed cheap, but I needed a OTK, and it wasn't easy what with the conditions and card restrictions. I hope I won't have to do that too much._**


	7. The Ishtar Siblings

**CHAPTER SEVEN**

The girls rushed over to me, and Sabrina hugged me warmly while the spies offered me their rejoice, while Seeker lay flat on the ground I approached him and gazed down at him with pity, but reached down and grabbed his deck. I found Clover's Red Spy Girl, and since I won the duel, I also took Seeker's only keycard piece for myself. It was one I needed too, giving me two pieces, but I still needed to win four more.

"Here you go, Clover, just like I promised." Clover graciously took her card and felt ever so happy to have it back, but she gave a thankful peck on the cheek. "You're the best, Mykan."

I smiled at her, but suddenly I felt something strange as I held Seeker's cards. "What's the matter?" Clover asked. "These cards…" I said "Something's rubbing off on my fingers."

Sam could smell something sweet coming from the cards too. "These cards are all marked!" she growled. "He was a cheater!" snapped Alex.

"Not anymore!" I said as I angrily tore all the cards to shreds, while at the same time, Seeker began trembling as he lay on the ground and cried out "No… please, masters don't do it! I beg of you! I tried my best…!"

Everyone in the crowd couldn't understand what this was all about, but it soon got serious as Seeker's body was suddenly glowing and he stood upright on his feet like a ghoul. "That glow!" I said "…It's millennium magic. Someone's controlling him!"

"You're correct!" hissed a sinister voice, and another one followed "Congratulations on defeating our rare hunter, Seeker; though he was the weakest of our band."

"Okay, what is going on here?" Alex demanded to know, but Sabrina and I clenched our fists. We thought those voices sounded familiar. Then, in a magical glow, the two hosts of the tournament appeared in magical images above Seeker's head.

"Okay, seriously, whoever you are, how are doing all this?" asked Sam

Then the images of the two figures above Seeker held up two millennium items; The Millennium Ring worn on the sister's neck, and Millennium Rod held by her brother, which further explained everything. "We have little time for this fool's nonsense. So using our items, we have taken control of his body, and trapped his mind in the Shadow Realm."

They demonstrated more of their powers by making Seeker's body flip twist and turn in odd directions, which really freaked us all out. "You see, we are in complete control." growled the brother. "We have been waiting a long time for this Mykan and Sabrina."

"And now that you have taken our bait, you soon you will be all ours." added the sister.

"You guys know these psychos?" asked Alex.

"Yes, we do." said Sabrina. "Ishizu and Marik Ishtar; Former students from Duel Academy…"

We went on explaining how Marik and Ishizu were two of the smartest students on campus. They seemed to know practically every aspect about Ancient Egypt and all the rituals and things even I hadn't yet studied. They were skilled duelists as well, and didn't lose as often as many did. Marik even made it to face Sabrina a couple of times, and I had faced Ishizu in several exam matches. It almost looked as if we were becoming friends.

"They speak the truth…" said Ishizu "However, the two of you did something to each of us that we will never forget." added Marik, and they went on explaining how as time passed, the two siblings had fallen in love with me and Sabrina they each respectively wanted to be with us, but Sabrina and I had already fallen in love with each other completely killing any and all chances they had.

Consumed with outrage and devastation, Ishizu and Marik left Duel Academy were never seen again. For they had gone on a worldwide adventure in search of hope to cure their minds and soothe their hearts of the devastation they had suffered, when their journey's lead them to the mysterious tombs of Egypt, where they found the Millennium Ring and Rod, which granted them powers beyond their wildest dreams. They had never felt anything like it. Anyone who dared to oppose them ended up regretting it and paid their dues.

…They pretty much became a pair of power hungry siblings, and decided to start their own gang of rare hunters to exact vengeance on all they deemed cruel and monstrous to others. That's why they started robbing banks and stealing goods. Their empire continued to grow, and soon Marik and Ishizu decided to rectify their own errors.

That was pretty much what Seeker was doing. He was dueling on their behalf, and if I had lost to him I would have been told to divorce Sabrina and go to Ishizu, which would leave Marik free to take Sabrina. "And so now, here we stand." hissed Marik.

"You organized this whole tournament just so you could get Mykan and Sabrina?!" growled Sam.

"Okay that is way out of line here." added Clover "Though slight light understandable and bit romantic, but still wrong!"

The siblings snickered wickedly. "Actually, we are taking what was rightfully meant to be ours form the beginning." hissed Marik.

The image of Ishizu nodded and revealed to be holding in her arms…

"Erica!" cried Sabrina. It all made sense now! Marik and Ishizu had their rare hunters kidnap Erica and use her to lure us in, and they fed me false images of the future by manipulated my Millennium item with each of theirs so I couldn't sense it coming.

"You monsters…!" I growled "Give us back our baby right now!"

"Renounce your love and marriage for each other and come to us willingly, and you may see your child." said Ishizu "Make it easy on yourself Mykan. You know we are meant for one another. Come with me and we will raise your child together."

"Come with me, Princess." said Marik "Come with me and I promise you a world of power and riches beyond your imagination. Together, we will be unstoppable."

You can bet Sabrina and I refused, but the siblings remained unfazed and also refused to give us Erica back. If we were that desperate to get her back, all we had to do was come and get her, at the finals, which gave Marik and Ishizu the advantage. They had rare hunters all over Duel City, and they wouldn't be as easy to beat as Seeker was. If Sabrina and I lost so much as one duel, we would be forced to surrender to the siblings for Erica's safety.

"Why, that's blackmail!" I growled.

"Call it what you will…" hissed Ishizu "But either way, we will have you two, and we will rule the world by using the power of the Egyptian God Cards!"

The spies felt confused. "Egyptian what…?" asked Alex.

Sam remembered studying like this back when I taught her and the girls back at Mali-U…

Millennia ago, in Ancient Egypt, a trio of powerful behemoths stormed across the land. _Obelisk the Tormentor_, _Slifer the Sky Dragon_, and _the Winged Dragon of Ra…_! These creatures were so incredibly powerful, everywhere they went they spread chaos and destruction, until they were defeated by the brave pharaoh of Egypt, ending the terror.

Marik and Ishizu were aware of this tale too. However, they revealed that when the game of Duel Monsters was created by Sabrina's father, he resurrected those three mighty beasts as dueling cards. Control one and you can destroy a million armies, but control all three and the planet itself will be at your command. However, after the first three prototypes of the cards were made, strange and unexplainable things began to happen as misfortunes. It was if the god were angry for someone creating the cards and making a mockery of their spirits.

Deciding that the cards were too dangerous, but not risking destroying them out of fear of causing more damage. He had the cards hidden, buried in deep crypts all around the world.

Marik and Ishizu had heard of the cards and were constantly searching for them. They already possessed two of the three. The third one, they sought but had no idea where it was yet, but they planned to find it and add it to their collection and become virtually unbeatable!

Mandy heard everything that was said, she wasn't so sure of all this magical mumbo jumbo, but liked what she heard about these god cards and becoming unbeatable, and decided that she would gather the cards for herself and use them to become the number one duelist, and teach me and the spies a lesson we'd never forget for her humiliations.

"Hear me now, both of you!" I snarled at the siblings "You'll never succeed in your plans, and Sabrina and I will get our daughter back."

"I second that!" said Sabrina, and the spies stood by our sides agreeing too, but Marik and Ishizu assured us that victory would be theirs. Already they were blocking my necklace's power out, and their rare hunters were all over the place, and what's more, they even got a good glimpse of my dueling strategy.

"You will be mine yet, Mykan Jaden." said Ishizu

"You will also be mine soon, Sabrina, along with the entire world as well." added Marik, and the magical images vanished, and Seeker fell unconscious in the street, a team of paramedics came to take him to get treatment, but the girls and I now realized how fully serious this whole tournament was. Though most of the other duelists didn't buy all this magic stuff and just went about their way, the girls and realized that failure was not an option. So many things now lay on the line, and we weren't going to let those two creeps get away with it.

We made promises to each other that we'd all go to the finals together, and more than triple our chances of winning it all and putting an end to all this. "Thank you, girls..." I said. "Together, with our friendship, trust and believing in one another, I know we will win."


	8. Clover's Crisis: Part 1

**CHAPTER EIGHT**

With our goals settled, we all decided to head off into the city to start dueling. Sabrina and I remained close as we didn't want to let each other out of or sights, and the girls split up. Our rendezvous would be in town square after a few hours to compare scores.

The girls all needed to win five more keycard pieces while I needed four. There was still, however, the matter of even finding any opponents who had any keycards that we actually needed.

Clover managed to win her first duel easily, and got her second piece and a new rare card that would really give her hero cards a much needed burst of power. Now she needed four more, but who to face next?

Suddenly, she could see a big crowd up ahead, and walked over to see what was going on, and much to her discomfort, a duel was going on between some nerdy kid and Mindy, Mandy's equally snobbish cousin. She wiped the floor with the floor with the nerdy guy, winning the duel and taking from him his only keycard piece, and his rarest card. "Promise me, you'll take good care of it?" the kid asked trying to not to cry, but Mindy merely scoffed "This card here's about as pathetic as you and your duelin' skills, but maybe I could use it for a new coaster for my drinks."

The kid ran off in tears, but Mindy merely laughed at him. Now she had two keycard pieces and was eager to get another one. "Who wants to be the next butt for me to kick?" she asked.

"Hey, Mindy!" snapped Clover as she stepped through the crowd "Well, lookie what we got here." sneered Mindy "Mandy told me you losers were wanderin' around these parts, and here I was hoping to run into you, and yet you deliver yourself."

Already, Clover didn't like her voice "Oh, it is so on!" she said and she and Mindy glared back and forth at one another in a stare off, until finally they stood ready, and held out their card pieces showing that they both had only two pieces each, and both pieces were exactly which the others needed. "Well, looks like I'm going to have the pleasure of knocking you out of the tournament." Mindy teased. "As if… just make sure I don't knock you out first, which, FYI, I so will!"

Clover didn't know much about how Mindy dueled, but she felt confident that she would win no matter what. She had too at all costs.

Their disks were set and their life points were up, and their first cards were drawn.

_"…DUEL!_

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 8000 VS Clover: 8000_**

As Clover gazed down at her hand she felt she couldn't have drawn a better hand a figured the duel would be over faster than she thought, unaware that Mindy was secretly plotting against Clover and already had an idea to severely cripple her deck and strategies. "I'll start us off!" she said "I summon **_FAMILIAR KNIGHT _**in attack mode!"

**_(Atk: 1200)_**

"Now I'll place a second card facedown, and that ends my turn."

"Took you long enough." sneered Clover "Time to throw down and I'll start by summoning **_ELEMENTAL HERO SPARKMAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 1600)_**

"Sparkman, attack…!"

Clover's Sparkman destroyed Mindy's monster easily and dealt her a little bit of damage.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7600 VS Clover: 8000_**

"Ha! Sucker! You triggered my knight's special ability; it lets me call out a four-star monster right form my hand. So look out, here comes **_THE CREATOR INCARNATE!"_**

**_(Atk: 1600)_**

Clover didn't seem too fazed about that. "Nice move, but you forget… your knight's ability lets me summon a monster from my hand as well. So I play **_ELEMENTAL HERO CLAYMAN _**in defense mode.

**_(Def: 2000)_**

Mindy didn't seem too fazed either and just continued to smile smugly at her, but Clover ended her turn with one card facedown. "What, is that the best you can do?" Mindy taunted. Clover narrowed her eyes growling softly, but Mindy drew her next card and smirked wickedly. "I sacrifice Creator Incarnate, and call on out this bad boy; **_THE CREATOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 2300)_**

Clover gazed up at the new eight-star monster in confusion. "Whoa, whoa, time out here! You need to sacrifice two monsters to summon that thing."

"Wow, you really are as dumb as your fashion sense." sneered Mindy, "I special summoned him using my Incarnate's special ability. All I had to do was sacrifice him, and bingo, here's big daddy. But don't take my word for it, take his!" and with that, she ordered Creator to attack Sparkman!

"Think again!" snapped Clover "I activate **_HERO SPIRIT!"_** She played it just as her monster got destroyed, but thanks to the power of her trap, Clover took no battle damage. "Sorry, Mindy, but not good enough…!"

Mindy growled softly and ended her turn, but sinisterly thought in her mind as she gazed down at her facedown card. _"Just you wait, Clover. When I spring my little surprise on you, you're gonna be burnt toast!"_

"My draw…" said Clover as she drew "Sweet! Okay, Mindy, get ready for the big push. I play **_POLYMERIZATION…"_**

"Got'cha!" Mindy suddenly shouted! "You fell right into my trap; **_CURSED SEAL OF THE FORBIDDEN SPELL!" _**Clover was in serious trouble as Mindy explained, that by discarding one spell card from her hand, Clover's Polymerization was canceled out, but in addition, Clover for forbidden from ever playing that again for the remainder of the match!

"WHAAAAAAAT?!" cried Clover.

Mindy explained how she had heard stories from Mandy of Clover and the others always beating her, and how Clover's strategies relied heavily on fusion. This gave Mindy all she needed to know to cripple Clover's strategies and make it easier to beat her. "I only wish Mandy were here to see the look on your face, and would serve you right for beating her so much!"

Clover was outraged, but refused to give up. "Just because you stopped one of my cards doesn't mean I can't duel at all. I'll throw a monster in defense-mode, and end my turn."

"Fine by me." said Mindy "Now I think I'll show you some real duelin' power. Thanks to my Creator's special ability, all I discard one card form my hand and then revive one monster from my graveyard, and I choose my Creator Incarnate!"

**_(Atk: 1600)_**

"But he won't be hanging around here for too long, I'm sending him back to the grave so I can summon this bad boy; **_AIRKNIGHT PARSHATH!"_**

**_(Atk: 1900)_**

Clover had nearly lost complete control of herself at the very sight of the handsome monster. She felt as if she was staring into the eyes of a handsome prince ready to whisk her off her feet. Mindy took advantage of this and decided to slap her back into reality by ordering her knight to attack, and it destroyed Clover's facedown instantly; **_WROUGHTWEILER, (Def: 1200)_** and Clover's life points took 700 points of damage.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7600 VS Clover: 7300_**

"Okay, what was that all about, and why did my life points get hit?" snarled Clover.

Mindy snickered wickedly "That was MY monster beatin' the brains out of your puny mutt, and thanks to his specialty, he deals you piercing damage, and also… I get to draw one card each time he does."

"Yeah…? Well, I got news for you. Since you destroyed Wroughtweiler, I get to add Sparkman and Polymerization back to my hand."

"For all the good that'll do ya for." sneered Mindy, and she ordered her Creator to destroy Clayman, which he did easily. Mindy cockily cackled and taunted Clover endlessly for her dueling style. "I can't believe Mandy ever had this much trouble with you bores. I'll place one card facedown and end my turn just to see you mess up some more!"

Clover was finding it hard to maintain her cool. "I am really getting tired of hearing your voice." She muttered as she drew her next card, and she got that look in her eye that made her lookout to have a plan.

"I play **_ELEMENTAL HERO BUBBLEMAN_** in attack-mode!"

**_(Atk: 800)_**

Mindy blinked once in confusion, "That's your big move, an overgrown soap bubble with goggles?" She began to laugh hysterically, but Clover merely smiled "Hate to burst your bubble, Mindy, but I got more than just him. I activate the spell **_BUBBLE SHUFFLE_**, and with it I can change Bubbleman and your knight, into Defense mode!"

**_(Def: 1200)_**

**_(Def: 1400)_**

"And what's more, I can sacrifice Bubbleman and summon one Elemental Hero in my hand. So, come on out, **_ELEMENTAL HERO BLADEDGE!"_**

**_(Atk: 2600)_**

Mindy gasped in shock. "No way…!" she cried out. "Way!" snapped Clover "And here's another way that he's going for… yours!" Bladedge, attack the Creator!"

**_(Atk: 2600) VS (Atk: 2300)_**

Mindy braced herself as the shockwaves form the impact blasted past her.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7300 VS Clover: 7300_**

The score was now even, and Clover was beside herself with glee. The Creator couldn't be special summoned form the graveyard and she felt she was in the clear. "It's your move, Mindy. Got any other tricks you'd like to pull?"

Mindy growled and drew her card. "Huh…?" and then she smirked wicked. "Oh, I got a trick to pull, and you're gonna love it, loser! First, I'll switch my knight back into attack mode!"

**_(Atk: 1900)_**

"Now, for the main event…! I reveal my facedown spell, **_BLACK LUSTER RITUAL!"_**

"A ritual…?" said Clover as the images for the offering appeared, and Mindy offered another Creator from her hand, as it had eight stars, exactly what's she needed to summon a big monster to bring Clover to her knees. "Check it out, the **_BLACK LUSTER SOLDER!"_**

**_(Atk: 3000)_**

"Three-thousand points?!" cried Clover.

"You bet'cha…! This top star's got three thousand big ones, all set to put you and your monsters out to pasture." She ordered her soldier to attack, and Clover's Bladedge was sliced to pieces. "Bladedge, No!" cried Clover.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7300 VS Clover: 6900_**

"But wait, there's more. Now my knight attacks you directly!"

Clover whimpered as the knight charged forth and struck her hard, dealing her a fully 1900 points of damage, and knocking her to her knees.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7300 VS Clover: 5000_**

Plus, Mindy got to draw another card, but she was starting to feel she didn't have to, and continuously taunted Clover as she sat on her knees. "Now I really wish Mandy were here to see this, on your knees where you belong and there's nothin' much you can do about it. You may as well do what's right; give me your keycard bits, and get your ugly face out of this tournament."

A lot of the spectators were exchanging concern back and forth that Clover didn't seem to stand much of a chance now. She had no other cards in play, and only two cards in her hand, Sparkman and a useless Polymerization card. Even Clover was having huge doubts of being able to pull this one off, when suddenly she remembered what she had promised me and the others…!

Remembering this, she bolted upright onto her feet, much to Mindy's shock and annoyance. "Don't tell me you still think you can win." she scoffed. "I'll tell you one thing…" Clover sneered seriously "It's one thing to mess up my favorite designer outfits, it's another thing and much worse making me almost forget a promise I made to my friends; never to give up until it's really over."

She placed her hand over her deck and swiftly drew, proclaiming "Here goes… something!" She just hoped it was something she could use!

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	9. Clover's Crisis: Part 2

**CHAPTER NINE**

Clover held up her card, and she peeked at what she drew. "I'll set one monster in defense-mode and end my turn!"

Mindy honestly didn't know what was more pathetic other than she felt that Clover was struggling in vain. She drew her next card. "Time for me to do what my cousin couldn't, and take out the trash!" she scoffed. Her plan was to wipeout Clover's monster with her knight, and then hit her directly with her soldier. "Go knight, attack! Say bye-bye to your monster."

Indeed, Clover's monster was crushed easily for it was a **_WINGED KURIBOH, _**but Mindy didn't recognize it at first. "Hey, what's that monster? Mandy never said anything about a fuzz-ball."

"That little fuzz-ball is just something I threw in at the last minute before the tournament." said Clover "And by the way, when Winged Kuriboh is destroyed, I won't take anymore battle damage from any of your monsters for the rest of this turn. So it looks like I'm not out after all!"

Mindy knew she had been outsmarted, and felt stupid for not realizing that Clover would at least have some sense to add a few new cards to her deck, but it still didn't matter much to her. "So you got lucky and avoided me again, that doesn't mean you're out of the woods!"

_"And soon I'll put an end to you for good, you little pipsqueak."_ she thought quietly.

Clover felt relieved that she got out of that one, but she really needed another good draw. "Come on now…" she muttered as she drew her next card. "I play **_POT OF GREED._** So now I draw two cards." She drew her cards and really liked what she got and smirked wickedly at Mindy. "Here's another card you're not aware of, Mindy; **_FUTURE FUSION!"_**

"Huh?" went Mindy, and Clover explained that she could use her new spell to send monsters directly from her deck to the graveyard, and then in two turns, which Fusion Monster she was going for would be summoned. "Now that that's all settle, I think I'll send Avian and Burstinatrix to the grave, just like that, and in two turns, I'll get my fusion monster, but for now, I'll throw down a facedown, and summon Sparkman in defense-mode!"

**_(Def: 1400)_**

Mindy could see what Clover was up to; stalling until she could get that fusion monster she wanted. "It's my turn now, and I'm going to wipe you out before you even get close to that monster of yours!" She ordered her knight to attack, and Sparkman was destroyed.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 7300 VS Clover: 4800_**

Mindy drew her next card, but she set off Clover's trap. "I play **_HERO SIGNAL!" _**shouted Clover "Now I can go into my deck and call out another Elemental Hero, and I pick Clayman!"

**_(Def: 2000)_**

"Ha! You think that overgrown pebble can save you. Your head must be rock-hard." Mocked Mindy and she destroyed Clayman with her solider. "Take that! Now I place one card face down and end my turn."

"Took you long enough." snapped Clover. She drew her next card and she really loved what it was and shrieked "SWEET! Ah, yeah! Who's'da girl…?"

"Will you just play already?!" shouted Mindy.

Rather than feel insulted by Mindy's attitude, Clover grinned wickedly at her. "Oh, you're not going to like this. I play **_MIRACLE FUSION!"_** Mindy gasped, and remembered that card allowed Clover to remove monsters in her graveyard form play to perform a fusion. "I remove Avian, Burstinatrix, Bubbleman and Clayman form play, in order to summon **_ELEMENTAL HERO ELECTRUM!"_**

**_(Atk: 2900)_**

Mindy gazed up at the glowing Light creature in awe. "See, Mindy…" Clover said "I can't use Polymerization, but there's more than one way to get the job done."

Mindy growled softly, but her expression quickly changed. "Smooth move, but I also see one other thing… your monster is still weaker than my soldier. So I really don't see anythin' to fret about."

"Um, actually, you do, and that's his special ability, and one of which is he lets me shuffle all my banished heroes back to my deck."

Mindy still didn't see anything to worry about that.

"Oh, when I said ability, I meant abilities!" hissed Clover "You see, though Electrum is a Light monster, he can also be treated as any other type, except for Dark, and as a cherry on top, his attack power rises by 300 if you control any monsters that match any of his five attributes!"

Mindy gasped! Her Black Luster Soldier was an Earth type, and the Knight was a Light monster, therefore, Electrum's attack went up to 3400. "I know… it's harsh." Clover said sarcastically "Electrum, attack!"

Mindy watched as Clover's monster busted her soldier down to pieces!

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 6900 VS Clover: 4800_**

"Too bad, Mindy…! Looks like you're on the chopping block now."

Mindy felt steam building up inside her, and she felt it was time to let loose the little surprise she had been saving all this time. She drew her card, "Now I'm going to teach you a lesson you won't soon forget with the help of my best card of all!"

"Huh?" went Clover "You mean I didn't just blast your best card?"

"Duh…! What do you think I just said?" sneered Mindy "My best monster _is_ a Black Luster Soldier, but of a different kind, and to summon him I have to remove one Dark monster and one Light monster out of my graveyard!"

Once she removed Familiar Night and her Creator, a huge flash of bright light shinned from her side of the field. Clover wished she had brought her shades with her and winced back. "What's going on? What is that light?"

Mindy just snickered wickedly as she summoned her rarest monster forth. "And there ya have it; **_BLACK LUSTER SOLDIER- ENVOY OF THE BEGINNING!"_**

**_(Atk: 3000)_**

The light faded, and Clover didn't know what to think, even though it looked like the Black Luster Soldier, and was clearly weaker than her Electrum, she had a bad feeling Mindy was about to spring a nasty surprise on her, and she was right. "Comin' up, one super soldier specially."

The soldier's sword glowed brightly, and he fired a huge beam at Clover's monster, removing it from play just like that. "Electrum!" cried Clover.

"Done like dinner, which is what you'll soon be yourself!" snarled Mindy "But lucky for you, since I just used this effect, I can't attack, so I'll place two cards facedown and end my turn, but I doubt there's pretty much anything else you can do."

"Wrong!" snapped Clover as she drew her card "There's plenty I can do." Her Future Fusion card began to glow brightly, as it had been two turns. Mindy had totally forgotten about it. "Too bad for you…" Clover said "Now I get to summon my monster; **_ELEMENTAL HERO FLAME WINGMAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

"That's it? That's what you were waitin' for?" laughed Mindy.

"Yeah, um, I wouldn't be laughing if I were you, because I'm going to play this card, **_SKYSCRAPER!"_**

The ground began to rumble as a huge city of tall buildings surrounded the girls and the spectators around them. "So, relyin' on a field spell, huh?"

"You're burning up." said Clover and she ordered her Flame Wingman to attack the soldier, "And by the way, since his attack is lower than your monster's attack, Flame Wingman gets an extra 1000 points."

With its attack at 3100, Flame Wingman was sure to destroy the soldier, "Think again, slicker, I play a trap **_SHIFT!"_**

"Ah!" gasped Clover. She remembered I had that card once, and it let Mindy change the target of her attack to her Knight, which meant that Flame Wingman's attack returned to normal, as the Knight's attack was not higher, and the night was destroyed.

**_(Atk: 2100) VS (Atk: 1900)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 6700 VS Clover: 4800_**

"Oh, well. Still doesn't matter. Now Flame Wingman's ability activates. When he destroys a monster in battle, you take damage equal to that monster's attack power, which is 1900!"

Flame Wingman moved into position ready to strike Mindy hard, but Mindy was ready for her again. "Think again. Activate **_DAMAGE POLARIZER!"_**

"What?!" cried Clover, as much to her horror, as Mindy explained, the effect damage was negated, so she took no damage at all, and in addition, both of them were allowed to draw one card. "Too bad, Clover; Looks to me like you're about to get a big beatin' after all! Looks like Mandy did a good thing handing me all that inform about your deck and all its strategies after all."

Clover never felt so outraged before, and she didn't want to believe for a second that it was over, but she had to end her turn anyway. Mindy drew her next card and wasn't willing to take any more chances with Clover. "Now, then… first thing we do is get rid of all these ugly eyesores 'a building's. Activate, **_DE-SPELL!"_** The Skyscraper card collapsed instantly, but Clover wondered why Mindy didn't just use it on her Future Fusion card, but she suddenly got her answer as Mindy ordered her Soldier to destroy Flame Wingman, and it did!

**_(Atk: 3000) VS (Atk: 2100)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 6700 VS Clover: 3900_**

Clover's field was now total emptied, "Oh, and did I forget to mention…" hissed Mindy "When my soldier destroys a monster in battle, he can attack you one more time!"

Clover's eyes bulged with fear, and the next thing she knew… WHAMM… She got struck hard and knocked off her feet, with a full 3000 points down the drain like that.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 6700 VS Clover: 900_**

Clover didn't know what she was feeling now. So many feelings were going through her; disbelief, fear, shame, and a little bit of outrage that her outfit was getting all dirty… but above all, she was feeling at a loss. Absolutely nothing in her hand could help her, and her field was completely empty.

"That's right, stay down there where you belong." Mindy rudely taunted "How does it feel to lose? You should know this all too well. It's about time you got what you deserve, and once I'm through here, I'm going to have just as much find finding your girl band and knockin' them out of the ballpark as well."

Suddenly, Clover gave a small twitch, and then another, much to Mindy's horror as Clover sprinted back up on her feet, gazed deeply at her and said "Mindy! I told you before. It's not over yet. You may have more life points, a kick-butt monster, but I still have life points, which means I can still duel! So save your mocks for when it's really over!"

Mindy couldn't believe that Clover just didn't know when to stay down and after all the punishment she inflicted on her. "Fine…! Be that way. Show everyone how to make a fool of yourself… not that you already weren't." she laughed and cackled endlessly, but Clover gazed down at her deck thinking in her mind _"Come on deck, this is it now. I'm counting on you. Don't let me down!"_

She drew her next card and peeked at it, and she suddenly realized what she could do even with the cards still in her hand. "This could work." she muttered softly. "Get Ready, Mindy, I play **_POT OF AVARICE! _**Now I shuffle five monsters from the grave into my deck, and I get to draw two more cards." This now gave her four cards to work with, and she really liked what she got! "SWEET…! Now I re-summon an old pal of mine; Winged Kuriboh!"

**_(Def: 200)_**

Mindy yawned sarcastically. "Boring…! Are you going to let me finish you off or what?"

Clover sighed "Well, if you're that impatient, I'll throw down, one facedown and end my turn."

Mindy scoffed "Well it took you long enough!" and she drew her next card. She felt she couldn't already see through Clover's strategy; and how she'd used that overgrown fuzz-ball's ability to protect her life points again, but Mindy wasn't going to let her do it this time. None of the other cards she held would help her, but she decided she didn't care. This duel had gone on long enough! "It's time to end this, for good. Once I get rid of your fur ball friend, nothin' will stop me. It's over for you, Clover. Black Luster Soldier, attack her Winged Kuriboh!"

The soldier stood ready to attack and jumped right at Clover's Kuriboh. "Hold it right there! I discard two cards, and activate the spell, **_TRANSCENDENT WINGS!" _**It was another card Mindy had never seen or heard of. "What's that thing do?" she asked.

"Glad you asked…" replied Clover "See, when I play this card with Winged Kuriboh, he automatically evolves to a level ten monster!" Sure enough, while she was speaking, Clover's little fuzz-ball evolved into a big mighty brute, but his attack and defense powers remained the same, which Mindy pointed out.

"Don't you know points aren't everything? Since it's still your battle phase, I can sacrifice my new monster, and then I can destroy every monster in attack mode on your side of the field and you take damage equal to that monster's attack power, that's 3000!

"Huh…? Wait a minute!" cried Mindy, but she was already too late as the entire field exploded, and her Soldier vanished in a huge ray of light.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: 3700 VS Clover: 900_**

"Looks like I got you this time, Mindy. You were so obsessed with beating me, you didn't take the time to consider any other options you may have had, and that was your undoing."

Mindy couldn't believe this. Her best monster had failed her, and still all the cards she had couldn't be summoned or played. She was paying the price for stacking her deck incorrectly. "Just go!" she growled.

"Whatever." Clover said as she drew one card. "I play **_THE WARRIOR RETURNING ALIVE_**, which lets me get the **_BUBBLEMAN_** I discarded back then to my hand." Since he was the only monster Clover had, she special summoned him right away…

**_(Atk: 800)_**

"And since I have no other cards in play or in my hand, I can draw two more cards."

The cards Clover had, she felt she couldn't asked for better! "I play **_MONSTER REBORN, _**and I'll use it to get back the one monster that's still chilling in my graveyard; Sparkman!"

**_(Atk: 1600)_**

"And last but not least, I summon one of my newest cards that I won earlier… **_COMMAND KNIGHT!"_**

**_(Atk: 1200)_**

"And now that she's out here, all warrior monsters that I control gain an extra 400 attack points!"

"What… each…?" Mindy shrieked in terror, unable to believe was what Clover had just done. With attacks of 1200, 1600, and 2000, Clover couldn't be stopped now. "No! This can't be! I was about to win this whole thing!"

"You know, I actually feel sorry for you." said Clover "Oh well, them's the breaks. Let her have it, guys. Wipe her out!" and all three of her monsters charged straight at Mindy, striking her one, two, three… and knocking her out.

**_FINAL-SCORE:_**

**_Mindy: "0000" VS Clover: 900_**

"That's game!" Clover said striking her finishing pose. Mindy just sat on her knees feeling all dizzy and ashamed. "I… I lost? No way…! Do-over! Ugh-Uhn…!"

The spectators applauded and cheered for Clover for putting Mindy in her place. She then approached her and demanding she hand over her Black Luster Soldier –Envoy, and her only two keycard pieces. "Whoa, now…! Let's not get too heavy here." Mindy said trying to weasel her way out, but with a whole ring of angry spectators surrounding her, she was ultimately forced to comply and handed Clover her prizes. "Oh, and, have a safe journey home, slicker." She mocked as she turned and left, leaving Mindy in shame, but she was very relieved the duel was over. There were many times she thought she wasn't going to make it, but now all she needed was two more keycard pieces, and she got a really sweet warrior card two, but didn't think she'd be able to use it much.

Still, the tournament was far from over!


	10. Trust No One

**CHAPTER TEN**

You can believe that when Mandy heard about Mindy's defeat, for the first time ever, she was not sympathetic with her, and wasn't willing to help her. "You lost, and that's that! Now, get lost!"

"Wait! Just let me have one of your keycard bits. You've got a ton of 'em."

"I said No!" growled Mandy. "See ya later, loser!"

Mindy couldn't believe how her cousin was acting, but she wasn't willing to give up. "Then I challenge you to a duel."

"What?"

"You heard me, and if I win, you let me stay in the tournament with you."

Mandy hesitated for a moment, but then agreed to Mindy's terms "There's one thing though…" she said and suddenly handed her a pack of extra cards she could use to spruce up her deck with, after losing her rarest card to Clover. Mindy thought that neat, but couldn't understand why Mandy would do this. "With all these cards, how could I lose?"

That evil expression on Mandy's face remained as she prepared to duel. "Let's get this over with." said Mandy "I summon _this card!"_

Deeper within Duel City, the duelists were all walking about, and at other ends of the city, civilians were minding their own business, when suddenly a loud banging sound, followed by a small gust of wind, actually shockwaves from duel disk emulators, flew by.

"Did you see that?"

"What just happened?"

Poor Mindy lay flat on the hard ground in complete shock, and looked as if she had just fought with a hurricane. "That… card…!" she whimpered.

Mandy gazed grimly at her cousin and then walked off. She had other things to attend in this city. "I'll you yet, Mykan, and when I do… I'm going to teach you a lesson you won't forget for all the times you made me look like a loser!"

…

Meanwhile, in their secret lair, Marik and Ishizu were told of what their Rare Hunters had seen. "So, the third Egyptian God Card has been played?" asked Marik.

"Yes master." said the servant "We have positively identified its user."

Ishizu snickered wickedly "Excellent! Now that we know where it is, we will take steps to ensure that that card will be in our possession soon." The two siblings snickered, but their wicked moment was interrupted by the sound of Erica crying from her playpen. "I am growing very annoyed with this child, Ishizu!" growled Marik, but his sister ignored him and went to tend to the crying baby, but her presence only seemed to make Erica fussier. Even the servants couldn't stand the echoing of her cries and fled from the room.

Ishizu did her best to try and calm the baby down, rocking her softly and whispering "Hush, my child." and it actually worked, or rather Erica was crying herself out of breath and to sleep again. "There, sleep tight my child."

Marik was relieved that Erica had stopped crying at last, but he did find it somewhat annoying the way Ishizu acted towards it. "Look at you, fawning over that pipsqueak as if it were your own."

"The child _is_ mine, brother." she said sharply but softly "I would appreciate you refrain from mentioning that again."

Marik softly scoffed and left his sister to tend to the infant. He had his own work to do. "While my sister pines for the child's father, I seek its true mother." He sat down on his throne and gazed at the images of Sabrina. He gripped his Millennium Rod tightly in both love for seeing her, and in anger that she was walking with me, and even looped her arm around mine and rested her head on my shoulder as we casually strolled through the city.

"It's time to make my move! Soon, the girl will be mine, and once we obtain the third Egyptian God Card, there will be none to stand in our way! We will control the world!" He snickered sinisterly, yet softly.

…

Sabrina and I had already had a couple duels, and they all turned out to be rare hunters working for Marik and Ishizu, but we managed to defeat them and, gain new cards for our decks as well as pieces of the keycards. Now Sabrina had three and I had four. Of course we did have enough of the right pieces to make a whole card and qualify at least one of us for the finals, but that wouldn't be fair or right. We both promised to go to the finals together, so we were both going to earn our ways up to the top.

For now, we had to focus on keeping our guard up. For all we knew rare hunters were lurking round every corner just waiting to strike at us and force us into another blackmail duel. If only my Millennium Necklace would work, I could sense the danger and be ready for it, but I didn't stand a chance against Marik and Ishizu's _two_ items.

…We would just have to remain ever vigilante!

We stopped for a lunch break at the restaurants in town. All the dueling really took it out of us. As hungry as Sabrina was, she didn't feel much like eating. "Are you okay?" I asked her. My wife looked at me with a sad expression "I'm just really worried about Erica."

I understood how she felt. Neither one of us stopped thinking and worrying if our baby was okay. Thinking about it so much brought tears to Sabrina's eyes. "Don't cry, darling. We'll get her back, and we'll make Marik and Ishizu regret even having messed with our lives."

Sabrina wiped her eyes with her clean napkin, and gazed at me with respect and belief. "I know you're right."

"I usually am." I said, and I kissed her tenderly. "That's why I love you." she said when we separated "You always remain confident, even in the most dire times."

"And you inspire me to be that, because I see it in you as well." I said to her. We kissed again, but we were startled when someone walked up to us with a camera in his hand. "Pardon me folks." he said politely, and told us he was with the Duel Time's magazine and was wondering if he could take a couple of shots of us for his publisher. "To think, Professor Jaden and his wife competing in this tournament; I know our subscribers will love it."

Sabrina and I couldn't see what harm it would do. The magazine was real, we knew because Sabrina's father had commissioned it, and the photographer seemed a decent young man, and he had identification and everything. "You may proceed." said Sabrina. The man felt giddy with joy and asked us to follow him to get a few better shots, preferably in an area where there weren't so many people around. So he led us to an empty area in the streets and told us to pose together. "Yes, that will do nicely." He hissed with a hint of wickedness in his voice "Okay now… three, two, one!" he snapped his shot, and everything went white, and before I knew it, I woke up lying flat in the street with people looming over me wondering if I was okay.

"What happened?" I wondered, and then I noticed "Sabrina…? Sabrina!" but she was nowhere to be seen. Then suddenly I remembered "That guy must've been a phony!" and obvious he had taken my wife away while I was unconscious. I had to find her, only I didn't where to even start looking, and I couldn't use the necklace to find her either.

She had to be somewhere!

…

Sabrina was just starting to come too. She found herself on the floor in an old abandoned warehouse. "What's going on? Where am I?" she asked aloud. Then she could hear the sound of someone snickering softly in the shadows "Looks like you're coming round, Princess."

"That voice!" cried Sabrina, and that same man who took our picture stepped forth, revealing he had used a special camera with a coma ray that knocked me and her out, and dragged her to the warehouse they stood in now. "Who are you really?" Sabrina demanded to know.

"I am Draco, obedient servant of my masters, Marik and Ishizu. Master Marik has a particular fondness for you, and once I and my dragons defeat you in a duel, you'll be forced to end your marriage with Mykan and surrender to Marik, and if you're thinking that your husband will find you, I wouldn't hold up my hopes. We're just two little specs in a giant city. He'd have to be a super spy to track you."

Sabrina's anger was rising, and as much as she wished to refuse this duel, she knew she didn't have much of a choice with Erica's safety on the line. "Fine then, I'll accept your challenge. You'll soon find I'm more than just a little princess. I have dragons of my own to duel with."

Draco snickered, he knew of Sabrina's Cyber Dragon deck and the strategies involved "A duel of dragons against machine dragons, this should prove interesting… for me when I crush you and show you how real dragons can crush your metal monsters easily."

Sabrina resisted the urge to mock him back and stood ready. Their disks were ready, and life points were counted up. _"…DUEL!"_


	11. Dragon Duel: Part 1

**CHAPTER ELEVEN**

I ran up and down the streets of the city searching for Sabrina. I sniffed the air very heavily too, for it was my only chance to gain leads. Sabrina used a very special perfume that imported specially from Europe called _"Scentsational Number 5" _its ingredients contained a small trace of ginger root, giving a very delicate and unmistakable aroma.

Still, even with that one lead it wouldn't be easy for me to find her, but vowed to search every inch of the city if I had to until I found my wife, and I had a strong hunch that was behind all this!

_"I'll find you, Sabrina, and I swear… if Marik and Ishizu have anything to do with this, they will regret it!"_

…

Meanwhile, Sabrina's duel was on…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 8000 VS Sabrina: 8000_**

"I'll go first…" hissed Draco "I summon one monster in defense-mode, and that ends my turn, but realize it's only a matter of time before you lose this duel, and your marriage."

Sabrina narrowed her eyes and drew her cards out. "It's my turn, and of course, since you have a monster and I have none, I can special summon this monster from my hand; **_CYBER DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

Her great beast roared loudly, and Sabrina ordered it attack the hidden monster. The monster; **_MASKED DRAGON_** was beaten easily, but Draco smirked wickedly. "Why thank you! You've activated my Masked Dragon's special ability."

Sabrina knew it let him summon a dragon with up to 1500 attack points right from his deck. "I think I'll summon this one; **_ARMED DRAGON LV 3!"_**

**_(Atk: 1200)_**

Sabrina recognized that card. It was part of a new line of Level class monsters her father had recently designed with me. The prototypes were stored in the vaults back home in the palace on the island, and wouldn't be released to the general public for weeks. "You stole those from the palace vault!" she scolded.

"Of course, that's what we rare hunters do; we see cards we like, and we just take them!" hissed Draco "You see my dear, what I've come to learn is to get ahead in life, you must be aggressive and show force!"

Sabrina didn't understand, but Draco promised to reveal it to her in time. "For now, finish your move."

"In that case, I'll place one card facedown. It's your move."

Draco sniggered as he drew his next card thinking cockishly _"Poor little princess. You may be confident now, but the dragons are doming for you and they won't quit without a fight."_

"As it is my standby phase, I'll activate my new dragon's ability, allowing me to tribute it, and transform it into **_ARMED DRAGON LV 5!_**

**_(Atk: 2400)_**

Sabrina growled softly under her breath. _"If only I had more time to read up on and understand these cards!"_

"And if you're thinking that little facedown card can save you, think again. I play **_STAMPING DESTRUCTION!"_**

"You should think again, I activate my card; **_WABOKU!"_**

With the trap activated before it got hit, it was still destroyed, but Sabrina wouldn't take any battle damage, nor would her Cyber Dragon be destroyed in battle. "Clever move, but not clever enough!" sneered Draco. "I still destroyed your card with my own, which deals you 500 points of damage!"

Sabrina winced softly as her score dropped…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 8000 VS Sabrina: 7500_**

… And Draco had even more surprises for her. "True, I can't destroy your Cyber Dragon by attacking it, but then again, my Armed Dragon's ability can do wonders!" He discarded one card form his hand, and Armed Dragon automatically destroyed Sabrina's monster, leaving her totally defenseless. "Of course, I still can't damage you, so I'll play one card facedown and end my turn."

Sabrina drew her next card, and wasn't sure of what other surprises Draco had lurking in his deck, but she knew she couldn't hold back. "You pulled a cool stunt there, now let me pull mine, and since my field is empty once again, I special summon **_CYBER DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

"And now I think I'll play **_MONSTER REBORN, _**to get back the other one!"

Her second dragon appeared, and now she was ready for a new strategy she had recently perfected. "Now I'll activate a spell card, **_PHOTON GENERATOR UNIT! _**Now, by sacrifice both my Cyber Dragons, I can unleash a whole new monster; say hello to **_CYBER LASER DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2400)_**

Draco gazed up at the new monster with awe, but then scoffed "You do realize both our dragons' attacks are equal?"

Sabrina smirked cheekily at him. "Yes, I realize… but your monster's not the only one with a special ability. Cyber Laser Dragon lets me destroy one monster with an attack equal to or less than his own."

Her dragon glowed majestically and the Armed Dragon was shot by its lasers and disintegrated. Draco clenched his fists and growled "It'll take more than that to tame me!"

"You want more? I'll give you more!" snapped Sabrina and she ordered her dragon to attack, and Draco braced himself and covered his eyes as the blast hit him. "Blow well struck." Sabrina said. She felt pleased with her move, but suddenly her dragon was vaporized in a bright flash of light. "Huh? What's happening?" she braced herself groaned until the bright light vanished. Draco laughed sinisterly at her, "When facing dragons of any sort, one must be strong and aggressive, so I activate my **_SAKURETSU ARMOR _**trap when your monster attacked, shattering it to pieces."

Sabrina growled in outrage, but Draco finally assured her this was exactly what he referred to before. "To control dragons and stand up to them, you must be fierce and strong; show them who the master is, and that they have nothing over you!"

Sabrina could see where he was coming from. "You mean show them nothing but cruelty and disrespect!" she said with her anger boiling "You're disgusting, just like your masters, Marik an Ishizu. You depend on blackmail and threats to ensure you get what you want."

Draco was losing his patience "I won't argue to the point with you and just satisfied with my own methods. It helps me get where I am today. Now, finish your move!"

"Fine then, I place one card facedown, ending my turn."

Draco drew his next card but still felt rather insulted deep down of how Sabrina criticized his method of taming strong creatures and cards. _"I'll show her what happens when I am enraged, and I have just the cards to do so."_

"Time to cast some magic on this field; I play **_LEVEL MODULATION!"_** Another card Sabrina was unfamiliar with, but Draco explained that it allowed Sabrina to draw two cards, but it allowed him to special summon one LV monster straight from his graveyard, ignoring the summoning conditions, "And I know just the one too; **_ARMED DRAGON LV 7!"_**

**_(Atk: 2700)_**

Sabrina gazed up at it in awe, and realized that this was obviously the card that Draco has discarded earlier. "There is just one problem…" Draco said "My dragon can't attack or use any of his powers this turn, but that's not my intention, for I now send it back to the graveyard, and summon its most powerful level yet; **_ARMED DRAGON LV 10!"_**

**_(Atk: 3000)_**

Sabrina stood her ground still unable to believe all this, but Draco was very pleased with himself. "You see, Princess. Aggression and fear is the right way to tame the beasts." and he ordered his dragon to attack Sabrina directly! "Prepare for a world of aggression!"

"Not so fast, I activate **_ENCHANTED JAVELIN!" _**shouted Sabrina! "It'll increase my life points by the total of your monsters attack power!" Her life points went up 3000, but then dropped again as she was still being attacked, making the last attack non-effective.

Draco couldn't believe he had been outsmarted again, but nevertheless, he was still ready for her. "Nice move, but let's see you escape this; from my hand I play **_LEVEL DOWN!?"_**

It let him take his LV 10 Dragon, send it back to the deck, and then summon his LV 7 dragon from the graveyard, ignoring the summoning conditions.

**_(Atk: 2700)_**

"Oh, no!" cried Sabrina.

"Oh, yes!" sneered Draco, and he ordered his monster to attack, and Sabrina got hit hard. She groaned and growled as the dragon hit her.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 8000 VS Sabrina: 4800_**

She looked up and growled, while Draco laughed at her. "Poor little princess! The tables have ultimately turned on you, and this time there's no knight in shining armor to save you this time. My dragons will continue on this path of destruction, and once I've obliterated you, you can kiss your marriage goodbye. Master Marik will be extremely pleased."

Sabrina felt a mixture of outrage and fear all together as she said in her thoughts _"I can't let this happen! I won't lose you, Mykan!"_

…

While in Duel City, the spies had met up after a long time of dueling to compare their status. None of them had accumulated all six keycard pieces yet, but neither of them had lost any duels, and actually gained new cards for their decks. "Just a few more wins and we all qualify for the finals." said Sam.

"Hey, anyone seen Mykan and Sabrina?" asked Alex.

They looked around, and suddenly they could see me walking up the street and sniffing the air heavily. "Uh… Mykan…?" Clover cried out, but I was so wrapped up in my search I didn't even hear her and just continued on my way. The girls chased after me and caught up with me. "Mykan!" snapped Alex, and she made me jump and yelp. They jumped and yelped in shock too. "Oh, girls…! Sorry about that, I was miles away!"

I told them what had happened to me and Sabrina and how I was looking for her and the girls agreed to help me search. "We can use our ex-compacts to track down the scent of her perfume." said Sam.

"Good, but we better hurry!" I cried "I can't even begin to imagine what trouble she's in." With that settled, we all dashed through the city, passing by Mandy's view around the corner. "Now what are those losers up to?" she wondered and thought she's follow behind us keeping well out of sight, believe we could lead us to something she wanted!

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	12. Dragon Duel: Part 2

**CHAPTER TWELVE**

Draco was still teasing and scoffing at Sabrina trying to dishearten her from going any further. "My dragon and all its brothers are staring you down, eager to roast up some more, princess. Why not make it easier and surrender to me and to Master Marik?"

Sabrina clenched her free fist, and gripped her cards tight in her other hand. She looked deeply yet fiercely at Draco and said "Because… I never give up, and even if I were to lose, it wouldn't make a difference. I will never love an evil madman like Marik."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 8000 VS Sabrina: 4800_**

She reached to draw her next card "My heart belongs to my husband, and it always will. I can feel him with me even when he's not next to me giving me strength!" She drew her card out "…and it really comes through for me! I special summon my third Cyber Dragon!"

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

Draco was growing really annoyed with all these Cyber Dragons she continued to summon. "Don't you ever summon anything original?"

"Oh, you want original? Fine then, I'll throw this into play; **_THE LIGHT HEX SEALED FUSION!"_**

**_(Atk: 1000)_**

Now Draco was confused. "What is that thing? I've never seen a card like that before."

Sabrina smirked softly "Really? And I thought you rare hunters knew everything; oh well, I guess you'll have to learn the hard way." She explained that her Light Hex had the ability to substitute itself for any Fusion Material monster she needed, provided all the others were the correct ones, and although her fusion monster required three Cyber Dragons, and only they and not substitutes to properly fusion summoned, that was no longer an issue either. "Now I simply sacrifice my Light Hex and my Cyber Dragon…"

The two monsters vanished in a portal of light, and when the light faded, success was reached. "And there it is; **_CYBER TWIN DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2800)_**

Draco growled in outrage and shock, but Sabrina stood by her beast with pride "Looks like the princess isn't as helpless as you thought." She then ordered her monster to attack, and Draco's dragon was disintegrated

**_(Atk: 2800) VS (Atk: 2700)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 7900 VS Sabrina: 4800_**

"Oh, and my Cyber Twin Dragon has two attacks in one turn! Attack him directly!"

Draco braced himself as the dragon blasted him hard.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 5100 VS Sabrina: 4800_**

Draco gazed up growling while Sabrina continued to smirk at him. "You'll pay for that, girl! Just you wait!"

"That's what they all say." said Sabrina "But for now, I'll activate a spell card; **_DIFFERENT DIMENSION CAPSULE!_** I take one card from my deck and remove it from play, but in two turns I get to add it to my hand. Now, I'll place one card face down and end my turn."

Her hand was empty, and it was Draco's turn. "If you insist…!" and he drew his next card, but the first thing he knew he had to get rid of Sabrina's monster. He couldn't risk being attacked by it again. _"I will not let this girl make a fool of me and my tactics!"_

"I'll set this one monster in defense mode, and end my turn!"

Sabrina simply drew her card, and ordered her dragon to attack, but Draco's monster was a **_TROOP DRAGON_**, and when it was destroyed in battle, Draco got to summon another one in its place to protect him further. Sabrina used her second attack to destroy it, and Draco summoned his third Troop Dragon. "You can't hide behind your dragons forever! I'll get through, and finish you off for good!"

Draco knew she wasn't kidding, and drew his next card "Huh?" and then he laughed maliciously. "Excellent, this is exactly the card I needed to ultimately clench this match!"

Sabrina looked Curious as to what he had drawn. "Now observe, as I activate **_DRAGON'S MIRROR! _**It lets me take my Troop Dragon, and four other dragons in my graveyard, removing them from play so I can perform a fusion of my own!"

"What?!" snarled Sabrina, and the fact that he was fusion together five random dragons just like that confused her, but she had a feeling she was in for a nasty surprise… and suddenly, there it was before her. "Behold, my ultimate creature…!" hollered Draco "The Legendary **_FIVE-HEADED DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 5000)_**

Sabrina had heard of this card before, but never thought she'd actually face it; a dragon with five heads, each a different corresponding element and matching shape; Earth, Fire, Water, Wind, and Dark! "Stare into its many heads, princess, for my ultimate beast is armed to take on even the strongest monsters your deck can produce!"

Sabrina sweated slightly, and Draco ordered his dragon to attack her, and her Cyber Twin Dragon was shattered in a humungous blast, rocking Sabrina's side of the field. She screamed loudly…!

…

As the spies and continued our search, we followed the scanners towards the boat shipping's outside the city, when all of a sudden I could feel a nasty feeling strike my nerves alerting me that something was dreadfully wrong. "Sabrina!" I cried. "We've got to find her and fast!"

"Wait, I'm getting a positive bearing! It's real strong" said Sam. Clover and Alex sniffed the air and could smell the scent of ginger. "Mmm… when we find her, I've got to ask if I can borrow that perfume!"

"Focus, Clover!" I scolded her, Clover blinked at me as if I were a mad lion, I apologized to her quickly. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell. I just want to know if Sabrina's okay."

"Hey, look…" cried Alex as she pointed an old abandoned warehouse near the docks. The scent and scans were coming loud and clear inside, and we could see being bright flashes coming from the window. "Let's go!" I shouted, and we all raced for the warehouse.

…

The blast finally finished and Sabrina stood twitching and panting from shock, and losing a ton of life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 5100 VS Sabrina: 2600_**

When the smoke had cleared, Draco laughed and laughed at her "Still think my methods are disgusting? It looks to me as if they've brought me the ultimate victory."

Sabrina hated to admit it to herself, but Draco had a point. She was just grateful he didn't have any of his other dragons in play, or she wouldn't have survived at all, but she feared on her next turn things wouldn't be so easy for her, even if she managed to summon another monster.

She got back up onto her feet and stood fiercely, much to Draco's dismay. _"She's still trying?"_ he thought in his mind _"She must have the nerves of a dragon!"_

Sabrina stood where she was growling and snarling. "I'm… not… beaten!"

Draco glared at her growling and snarling just like his dragon.

Suddenly, the big doors were busted wide open and the spies and I jumped inside the warehouse. "Sabrina!" I shouted.

She turned, "Mykan! You found me!"

I was so overjoyed to see she wasn't hurt, but I saw the rare hunter she was facing. "Just you wait until I get my hands on you!" The spies held me back "Whoa, whoa… Mykan, stop it!" cried Clover.

While the girls held me down and tried to cool me off, Mandy was watching from outside the doors, keeping well out of sight. "Looks like quite a duel going on here." She said softly to herself, then she spotted the huge dragon and almost wanted to scream, but didn't, the rest of us saw it too. "A Five-Headed Dragon…!" I said.

"Whoa, talk about your creepy." cried Alex.

Draco laughed at us "Yes, stare into its many eyes. For soon your precious wife will be defeated by its power, Mykan. After that, you and I will duel, and once I defeat you, Marik and Ishizu will have both of you. I can hardly wait to see what my reward will be."

The spies could see this dude was really whacko, and I felt my temper starting to slip away again, but then I gazed at Sabrina and she gazed at me. "Don't worry, Mykan. He won't do that."

I believed in her, and Sabrina turned to face her opponent. "Finish your move!"

"As you wish…" hissed Draco "I lay this card facedown, and end my turn.

He was plotting a huge trap for Sabrina to ensure his victory. If she tried to special summon any monsters or attack, he would be ready with his facedown card to get her and end the duel, but little did he realize that Sabrina was suspecting this, and already had a plan of her own…!

Sabrina stood ready. "My turn!" she drew her card "And of course, now that it's my second turn since I played Dimension Capsule, the card I put in it also returns to me." She gazed down at the cards in her hand, and she felt she was ready. "Please work!" she muttered softly. "Now I activate this card, **_SOUL RELEASE!_** And it lets me remove five of my monsters from graveyard from play!"

The spies wondered what she was trying to accomplish by doing that, but I felt I had a good idea what she was doing. "She used this strategy on me before." I said "Just watch…!"

"Now I play **_DIMENSION FUSION! _**At a cost of 2000 points…"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 5100 VS Sabrina: 600_**

"…I we both revive as many monsters in my banished zone as I can for this one turn. So I summon my three Cyber Dragon, and my Light Hex Sealed Fusion!"

**_(Atk: 2100) x3_**

**_(Atk: 1000)_**

Draco summoned all three of his Troop Dragons, and his Masked Dragon all in defense mode.

**_(Def: 800) x3_**

**_(Def: 1100)_**

Now he had a full field of dragons, and he laughed maliciously, not just for the dragons…

"Ha! You fell right into my trap, as I thought you would!" snapped Draco "Activate **_BOTTOMLESS TRAP HOLE!"_**

The girls, Sabrina and I all stared in shock.

"Too bad, Princess; your attempt was all for naught. I'm afraid that every monster you summoned with more than 1500 attack points is hereby banished again!"

All three of the Cyber Dragons vanished in a flash of light, but the Light Hex remained in play as it was weaker, but now Sabrina was practically defenseless. "Oh, no!" cried Alex "How's Sabrina supposed to defend herself now?"

"It gets worse too…" said Sam "She used Return form the Different Dimension. When her turn ends, any monster she played with it goes right to the graveyard!"

"Then she'll have nothing left at all!" cried Clover. "And all those big dragons- she'll be wiped out!"

I on the other hand remained calm and smug with assurance that "You're worrying over nothing, girls."

The spies gazed at e with confusion, and Draco heard me as well. "Stop fooling yourself, Professor." he sneered "You can see yourself your wife is as good as beaten. I and my aggression of dragons have won!"

Sabrina smirked wickedly. "Yes, you won… a loss of this duel."

"What?!" growled Draco "You lie! You're lying!"

"But I'm not…" said Sabrina "I figured you'd foolishly set up a trap for me like that. Knowing you couldn't stand it if I revived my Cyber Dragons, you'd remove them form play thinking I couldn't get to them; an amateur move that anyone could overcome if they know how."

Draco clenched his fists "Enough! You talk of escaping my dragon's aggression, but I see nothing to prove your point."

"Here's my proof…" snapped Sabrina "My facedown card activates; **_RETURN FROM THE DIFFERENT DIMENSION!"_**

Draco gasped in shock. Now Sabrina only had to pay half her life points…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Draco: 5100 VS Sabrina: 300_**

…And she could summon as many monsters banished monsters as she could. So her Cyber Dragons returned to the field once again. "And last, but certainly not least; the card got I got out from my capsule. I activate **_POWER BOND!_** So now I can merge my three Cyber Dragons to create my ultimate fighting force; **_CYBER END DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 4000)_**

The spies were really amazed, it wasn't often they got to see Sabrina's rarest monster. "I forgot how fierce looking that thing is." said Sam.

"Yeah, but wait! It's still not strong enough to beat the Five-Headed Dragon." Clover pointed out.

"Not really, Clover." I said, and I reminded the girls that Sabrina used Power Bond to make her monster; therefore its attack was instantly doubled to 8000! "No! This can't be!" cried Draco.

"Oh yes it is…!" snarled Sabrina "And if you're thinking I'm going after your Five-Headed Dragon, I'm actually planning smaller, because when Cyber End Dragon attacks a defending monster, the difference in their points is dealt to you as damage!"

"Ah! No!" cried Draco "You can't do this to me!"

"I can… and I will! Cyber End Dragon, wipe him out!"

"NO!"

Draco didn't have a chance; his Troop Dragon was wiped out, and with such a low defense against Cyber End's incredible power, he was through!

**_FINAL-SCORE:_**

**_Draco: "0000" VS Sabrina: 300_**

The spies stood with their mouth agape, but when the light faded they jumped, cheering for joy. "It's over. I've won!" Sabrina said softly. She turned to gaze at me, and smiled proudly at her.


	13. Threats

**CHAPTER THIRTEEN**

Mandy was still spying on us from outside, and as amazed as she was by Sabrina's sudden victory, "Don't these guys ever lose?!" she grumbled to herself.

Draco couldn't believe this. "It can't be… it's... impossible!" he groaned, but Sabrina continued to stare at him grimly. She didn't bother to take his Five-Headed Dragon. It wouldn't serve well in her deck at all, and she just beat it anyway.

I approached her and we embraced "I'm so glad you're okay." I whispered into her ear "You were wonderful out there."

Sabrina felt flattered, but the both of us approached Draco and fiercely demanded he tell us where Marik and Ishizu were keeping our baby. Fraught with fear and still shaken from his bitter defeat, Draco knew there was no escape, he was about to explain, when suddenly his forehead began to glow brightly and he screamed and howled in anguish, forcing us to drop him and step way back. The spies were freaked out…

…and Mandy couldn't' understand what was happening. "It's got to be another trick."

We, on the other hand, had seen this before, when Seeker went crazy. "We meet again, Mykan and Sabrina!" Then came those glowing images of the Ishtar siblings

"Marik and Ishizu…" I growled.

"Now, now, Mykan…" hissed Ishizu "Is that any way to speak to your future mate?"

Hear those words still disgusted me and Sabrina. "Will you two come to reason?" she growled "Mykan and I will never be yours!"

I nodded in agreement. "We're tired of all these mind games and rare hunters you leave for us you cowards! Why don't you come out of hiding and we settle this personally?"

The siblings snickered, "Now what fun would that be?" hissed Marik. "Besides…" Ishizu said as she motioned to Erica, sleeping in her playpen beside her throne "Someone has to look after my little one."

Seeing the images of the baby boiled our bloods to the tip. Even the spies felt their rages rising. "You sickos!" growled Alex "How can you play with their lives like this?"

"And worse, you use a little baby to get what you want. What's she ever done to you?" added Sam.

_"Silence!"_ the siblings bellowed. "The child is mine now as she was meant to be, just as Mykan is meant to be mine." said Ishizu

"The same applies to you and me, Princess. You two cannot escape your destiny, and we'll make sure of that." added Marik.

Sabrina and I didn't care what they said. No matter how many rare hunters they sent after us, we wouldn't let them beat us and destroy our marriage.

"I still don't get what all this dueling stuff has to do with It." said Clover "Why make them lose duels to agree to your terms."

The siblings snickered and explained that to them there was no finer way to force us into their terms. As spiteful and wicked as they seemed, having spent their lives studying the ancient ways and learning all the secrets of Duel Monsters and its history, they were not completely devoid of honor and fair play.

"Yeah, right!" snapped Alex "And that's why you go around bankrupting businesses and putting the world in financial jeopardy?"

"A fitting punishment for all the things other people enjoy but we were denied of." said Marik "The fools of this world merely simply go about, only caring for themselves, and never one bothering to realize that are some less fortunate than they are. Do they help them? Do they show any consideration? No!"

Sam tried to protest that there were some people kind enough, with all the donations, charities and drives and stuff dedicated to helping the poor, but the siblings scoffed at all that. "All your efforts were as useless before as they are now." Ishizu sneered "Well, my brother and I will put a stop to all this. We shall rule this world and we will decide what is right; and the key that will ensure us ultimate power and assurance of goals is not only having control of money, but the power of the three Egyptian God Cards!"

Marik nodded "Once we accumulated enough cash, and obtain all three Egyptian God Cards, with their magic combined with the powers of my Millennium Rod and my sister's Millennium Ring, there will nothing that can stand in our way."

There was no doubt in our minds now that these two had to be stopped at all costs, not just for the world's financial problems, for humanity's very safety as well, not to mention rescuing Erica and saving my marriage, and the best and only way was to stop them from beating us in duels as well as obtaining the god cards.

"Where are these three cards held again?" Sabrina asked.

"As we mentioned before; we already process two of the Egyptian God Cards…" said Marik "And thanks to our recent sightings, we now know where the third one is."

Mandy didn't like the sound of that, and decided to escape before she got into anymore of this trickery, and she really wanted to get back into the tournament to locate more rare cards to boost her deck.

"We'll say farewell for now…" hissed Ishizu "But until the next time we meet, we give you this warning. Somewhere within Duel City sits another one of our rare hunters, and she holds an Egyptian God card."

"Who is this duelist, and where will we find her?" I asked.

"She will reveal herself when the time is right and no sooner." hissed Marik "Your time is numbered. The next time we meet, victory shall be ours!"

The images vanished and Draco slipped to the ground unconscious, and a keycard piece slipped out from his pocket, landing by Sabrina's feet. She earned it too, and now only needed two more pieces to qualify for the finals.

Not wanting to leave Draco on his own, we got him to the hospital, but all of us were just appalled by how dangerous this tournament had become, and how all the duelists in town seemed to act as if nothing was wrong.

"I think maybe it's better they don't know." said Sam "Then maybe they won't have to get involved in all the dangers like we are."

"You have a point, Sam." I said "There's already enough people involved, what with all the businesses at risk. If word of the hostile takeover got out, it would send everyone into a panic."

We all agreed to keep the bad stuff to ourselves. "Well, back to the duels then." said Alex. We all still needed to win a few more duels, and the day was already half over. So we split up and headed off.

Most of the duelists had already been eliminated from the tournament, and there was still the problem of finding a duelist who actually had the missing keycard pieces we needed to complete ours.

Sam had four pieces and needed two more, but she needed to find a new duelist, and though she didn't show it on the surface, she was desperate to find one.

Just then, someone stepped out. "Samantha."

Sam turned and saw a tall and rather cute looking guy, but he somehow seemed a little familiar to her. "It's been a long time, hasn't it?" the young man said to her.

Sam still couldn't put her finger on it, and the dude could see she needed a little memory jogging "Do you remember this…?" he asked as he pitched to her a small photograph of the two of them in sixth grade, accidently lip locked because their braces got stuck together. "Ah, Lloyd Bradley… but you look so… so…"

"What, taller, handsome, instead of geeky and nerdy…? People change over the years, don't you know?"

"Yeah… I see that." Sam said trying not to get lost in his handsome eyes. "Get a good look at them. You had your chance years ago, now I have chance at payback!"

"What, payback…? What for…?"

"Come now. Don't you remember the reason we got lip locked together in the first place?"

Sam had completely forgotten until now. Lloyd used to be a nerdy kid in sixth grade, but his school skills and academics were nearly on par with Sam's which led him to having a huge crush on her, but she turned him down, despite being a nerdy kid herself, and a braniac in school, she turned him down just because he was a little too nerdy, with braces, acne, glasses, and lisp when he spoke.

He tried and tried to get on her good sign and show he could really be sweet, but she still coldly rejected him and prefer the more handsome students. As Lloyd turned to storm off, he slipped on the wet floor that had been mopped, and collided right into Sam, their braces got stuck together and it was practically their first kiss… each!

Sam felt humiliated, but not as humiliated as Lloyd was, after that his entire love-life went downhill. No girl gave him a chance, not even the nerdy ones like him. So, in high-school he got an image change and became the handsome charmer he was now, and it seemed to work for a while; girls couldn't resist his charm, but that was made him realize how ridiculous some people were… only caring about appearances, and not what's inside.

He then decided to coldly reject any girl who threw herself at him, the same way he was rejected by Sam and others in the past, but he was also sticking up for others; several of the girls who he rejected had nerdy boys crushing on them and they were cold heartedly turned down, so he showed them what it felt like to be _burned!_

"I can't believe you…" snapped Sam "You deliberately would hurt people's feelings just get revenge?"

"I wouldn't criticize me if I were you." said Lloyd "You yourself have often been fraught with getting paybacks from those who hurt you as well."

Sam tried to protest, but she ultimately couldn't argue with that. She never forgot the many times she had paid back guys for dumping her for silly reasons, whether it was for her looks or some other reason.

"You see, you're just like me, and like most people as well who have had their feelings burned to ashes. Well, I'd like to challenge you to a duel." he reached into his pocket and pulled out five keycard pieces "I'll give you one of these, along with my rarest card."

"Gee, you must be quite a duelist then if you've got five pieces." Sam compliment "Okay then. I accept!"

"Good…" hissed Lloyd "Finally I have a chance to get a little revenge on you for how you hurt me way back."

Sam could tell that Lloyd was obvious in way over his head about the whole revenge thing, and planned to use her ocean and water themed deck to cool him off, what's more, the way he spoke about burning lead to the fact that he used a deck built around fire types, which Lloyd admitted. "A duel of Fire against Water is it? Looks like the fire will be able to get its revenge too for the way water always puts it out."

Sam sighed "I am really getting tired with all this revenge stuff, but I'm ready when you are." They prepared their disks and life points. _"…DUEL!"_

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_The reference I use for Lloyd for is the episode "Truth or Scare"_**


	14. Feel the Burn: Part 1

**CHAPTER FOURTEEN**

The scores were set and their cards were drawn.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 8000 VS Lloyd: 8000_**

Lloyd snickered softly. "I must say, Sam, though I initially came to burn you, I still look forward to a good match."

"Well, I promise you that and a whole lot more." said Sam "So I'll start us off, and I summon a monster in defense mode, and next I'll put one card facedown. That ends my turn."

Lloyd drew his first card "A move that and it's already not a good one." he said "Especially when I activate this card; **_NOBBLEMAN OF CROSSOUT!"_**

Sam gasped softly. That card not only banished her facedown monster, **_GALE LIZARD_** from play, but since it was a flip effect monster, all other Gale Lizards in her deck were also banished.

"The first move of the game, and I've already burned three at once."

"Will you just go, already!" growled Sam.

Lloyd's features hardened "Very well, I'll place one card facedown, and I summon **_U.F.O TURTLE!"_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

"Attack her life points directly!"

Sam didn't have a chance and got burned hard.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 6600 VS Lloyd: 8000_**

"Good move." she said "But it'll take more than a hothead to keep me down." She drew her next card. "I summon this, **_7 COLORED FISH!"_**

**_(Atk: 1800)_**

She ordered her monster to attack, and the Turtle was squashed.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 6600 VS Lloyd: 7600_**

But Lloyd simply smirked. "You just activated my Turtle's ability. When it's destroyed in battle, I get to summon a new fire monster with up to 1500 attack points, and I choose to summon another Turtle."

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

"Really…?" snapped Sam "That's pretty clever. I end my turn."

Lloyd drew his next card and felt that Sam was doing exactly what he was; testing one another's strengths to see what they were truly capable of doing. "I think it's time to turn the heat up a bit." he said "I place one card facedown, and I summon **_SOLAR FLARE DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

"And now, my U.F.O Turtle will attack your fish head on!"

"What?!" snapped Sam.

**_(Atk: 1400) VS (Atk: 1800)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 6600 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

Lloyd had attacked her purposely so he could use his Turtle's special ability to summon another Solar Flare Dragon from his deck, giving him two. "Prepare to be burned away, Sam, because thanks to my dragon's abilities, they both will melt you 500 points of damage when my turn ends."

"Both?!" snapped Sam.

"Both!" replied Lloyd, and he ended his turn, and two heliographing flames touched Sam, they weren't hot but she still winced, and lost 1000 of her life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 5600 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

"Can you feel the burning, Sam?" he taunted "It's the same thing I felt, and even you felt it at times. Not only does it give my dragons the power to burn up your life points, they prevent each other from being attacked as they are pyro types."

This angered Sam, and put her in serious trouble. "I'm still not out of this." She said as she prepared to draw "And you seriously need to learn to cool off with all this burning stuff." She drew her card. "Luckily, I have my own sneaky methods. I activate the spell **_TRIBUTE TO THE DOOMED! _**All I do now is discard one card from my hand, and I can automatically destroy one monster you control."

With that, she shattered one of the dragons, but Lloyd didn't look scared a bit "You just fell into a trap; **_BACKFIRE!"_**

"Backfire? What does that do?"

Lloyd snickered "It gets revenge for me, by dealing you 500 points of damage every time you destroy my fire monsters."

Sam could hardly believe this, and was beginning to see how sneaky Lloyd really was, but she still wasn't finished. "Just because I lost a few life points doesn't mean I'm out, and speaking of out, it's time to get that monster of mine out from he graveyard, with my facedown trap, **_CALL OF THE HAUNTED!"_**

Her monster, **_TERRORKING SALMON_**, which she just discarded, was revived.

**_(Atk: 2400)_**

"Let's see if you can take on my fish now." teased Sam, and she ordered her Terrorking to attack. "I don't think so…" hissed Lloyd "Activate **_GRAVITY BIND!" _**The field was shrouded in waving energy affecting all the monsters on the field. "Too bad, Sam, but as long as this card is active all monsters with more than three stars in their level cannot attack."

Sam finally realized he had waited to play that card until the right moment. "Genius isn't it?" teased Lloyd. "Like I keep telling you, we're more alike than you think, we both feel, we both think, and we both seek vengeance. Feel the burn, Sam."

Sam was feeling the burn. Her eyes were blazing in anger and her forehead was red, exactly what Lloyd enjoyed seeing. _"Yes! Feel it! Embrace it!" _he thought in his head. "I end my turn!" Sam said. What choice did she have?

"That's more like It." hissed Lloyd as he drew his cards "Even though I can't attack your monsters, I can still play this; **_REMOVE TRAP!" _**With that card, he destroyed Call of the Haunted, and in doing so he destroyed Sam's Salmon. Then he just ended his turn and his Solar Flare Dragon blazed Sam another 500 life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 5100 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

_"This is bad!" _Sam thought to herself _"Every turn, my life points get weaker, but I can't even try to attack his monsters with Gravity Bind in play. There's got to be some way to take control of this."_

She drew her next card, and realized it would probably help her a little. "I summon **_CURE MERMAID!"_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

"She'll increase my life points by 800 every turn."

"I see, and interesting choice." said Lloyd as he drew his next card. "But we'll see if she can really help you, especially when I summon this; **_RAGING FLAME SPRITE!"_**

**_(Atk: 100)_**

Sam gazed at the tiny little monster. Its level was only one and it's its attack points hardly seemed much of a threat. "I don't see how that puny little runt can help you." said Sam.

Lloyd shook his head dismay "Judging by appearances again? Now you've got her all fired up! I guess she'll just have to show you what kind of runt she is… by attacking your life points directly!"

"What?!" snapped Sam, and the little sprite zipped and zoomed over to her, and just leapt right up and bashed itself right into her chest, pushing her back slightly.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 5000 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

She looked up from the attack, and Lloyd chuckled softly. "You've probably guessed, my monster's special ability lets her attack you directly, and every time she does successfully she gains 1000 more attacks points to blast you next turn, and don't forget, now that my turn is over, Solar Flare Dragon blasts you another 500 points."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 4500 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

This was very serious for Sam. She couldn't attack with strong monsters, and Solar Flare Dragon would keep on burning her away, while the Flame Sprite stood ready to cream her some more and get stronger each turn. _"Come on, think!"_ she kept saying in her mind _"You've got to think of someway to extinguish these flames!"_

While she was thinking, Lloyd continued to tease her "Much as I detest judging from appearances, I'd say you've about had it, Sam." Sam glared at him angrily. "Oh, it appears as if I'm right."

"You're wrong! I'll find some way out of this." Sam said and she drew her next card. "Since it's my standby phase, my Mermaid boosts my life points."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 5300 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

"Now, I'll place one card facedown, and I play this field spell, **_UMI!" _**The second she put her card into play, a big holographic wave of water splashed the field flooding it up to their ankles. "Water?!" growled Lloyd "My fire monsters!"

The power of Sam's field spell increased the attack and defense of Fish, Sea Serpent, and Thunder monsters by 200 points…

**_(Atk: 1800) _****_à (Atk: 2000)_**

**_(Atk: 1500) _****_à (Atk: 1700)_**

…while the attack and defense of Machine and Pyro type monsters decreased by 200.

**_(Atk: 1500) _****_à (Atk: 1300)_**

**_(Atk: 1100) _****_à (Atk: 900)_**

Lloyd growled in outraged. "It still doesn't matter how strong your monsters become, they still can't attack Me." he drew his card "Especially seeing as I can change that easily. I summon **_LITTLE CHIMERA!"_**

**_(Atk: 600)_**

"What?!" snapped Sam.

"Oh, yes. Thanks to this little guy, Fire monster's gain 500 attack points, while water monsters lose 400." So his monsters got a new power boost…

**_(Atk: 600) _****_à (Atk: 1100)_**

**_(Atk: 1300) _****_à (Atk: 1800)_**

**_(Atk: 900) _****_à (Atk: 1400)_**

…while Sam's got hurt yet again!

**_(Atk: 2000) _****_à (Atk: 1600)_**

**_(Atk: 1700) _****_à (Atk: 1300)_**

"And now, to continue the burn, Raging Flame Sprite, attack her directly!"

The Sprite dashed straight for Sam and was about to hit her, "Not this time!" snapped Sam "I activate the continuous trap; **_TORNADO WALL!"_**

The waters all around them rose up forming huge twisters blocking the Flame Sprite from advancing. "What's going on?!" snarled Lloyd "Attack her!" but his monster retreated back to his side. "Sorry, Lloyd, but as long as this trap and my Umi spell remain in play, you can't make any direct attack on my life points at all.

As outraged as Lloyd was, "I have to admit, that is pretty clever. But that doesn't mean I still can't get at turn is over…" said Lloyd "…So my Solar Flare Dragon gets to burn you again!"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 4800 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

"Now go ahead, Sam. I'm waiting to roast you up more."

Sam didn't know it was possible to be this annoyed with someone, and really hoped she could win the duel and wipe him out. She drew her next card, and it wasn't any good for her. At least her mermaid gave her more life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 5600 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

"I'll throw a monster in defense mode." She simply said "There's nothing else I can do."

"How sad…" said Lloyd as he drew his next card, and he really liked it. "Next up to the plate for the fire team is its own batter; **_ULTIMATE BASEBALL KID!"_**

**_(Atk: 500) _****_à (Atk: 1000)_**

It was another low leveled monster, not held down by the Gravity Bind, and Sam was almost afraid to ask "Don't tell me, his special ability raises his attack power?"

"Indeed…" replied Lloyd "His attack increase by 1000 points for every other fire monster in play, and since I have three, that totals 3000 points."

**_(Atk: 1000) _****_à (Atk: 4000)_**

"Four-thousand?!" cried Sam.

"Oh, yes!" hissed Lloyd "And by the way, do you think it was smart to leave your other monsters in attack mode?"

Sam gasped and realized it too late. She was so caught up in everything else; she completely forgot to change their modes. "Ah well, we all learn from our mistakes." said Lloyd as he prepared for his attack, and he had the perfect target in mind. "Baseball Kid, batter up and knock that mermaid out of the park!"

"No!" cried Sam as she watched the Baseball Kid swing his bat and knocking Cure Mermaid into the deep, destroying her… almost like she was being rejected by a guy.

**_(Atk: 4000) VS (Atk: 1300)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 2900 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

Lloyd reacted almost as if he had gotten hit instead of Sam, and held his heart, twitching. Seeing all that happen reminded him of all the times he had been hurt from all the rejections, and how he could feel that same feeling when seeing other guys get burned off like that as well. "The burn…!"

Sam saw this. "Lloyd, listen to me, you've got to stop with all this revenge and burning deal. It doesn't take brain surgery to see it's ripping you apart."

Lloyd snapped upright "You're wrong. The burn is what I need! It's the only thing that's kept me going all this time in this crazy world, and all the people in it for their fickle ways."

"I'm not wrong!" snapped Sam "Look at you; you're not the Lloyd I remember. You're letting all this burning and revenge take over you. Can't you just stop for a minute and realize not everyone in this world is bad?"

Lloyd wasn't in anymore of her lies "Why should I believe you? You're just like everyone else, and so am I. There is no difference, and the sooner I beat you, the sooner I can go to the finals and really turn the heat up, and speaking of which…" he snickered softly "I'm going to sacrifice my Raging Flame Spite, to activate the secondary effect of my Ultimate Baseball Kid, which burns off another 500 of your life points."

Flame Sprite went away and the Baseball Kid swung a huge fireball at Sam!

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 2400 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

True, with one less fire monster he lost 1000 attack points, but to him it was well worth it. "And don't forget, my turn is over! Do it, Solar Flare!" and Sam got burned yet again.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 1900 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

Now she was really stuck. On his next turn, Lloyd's would most likely be able to burn off the rest of her of Sam's life points. Her monsters still couldn't attack with Gravity Bind in play, and the Backfire Trap would deal her damage for destroying the monsters.

"You only one turn left, Sam; one last chance! Just like the many chances I gave you before and that others have had. Either way… the heat is on and you are about to be burned off, forever!"

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	15. Feel the Burn: Part 2

**CHAPTER FIFTEEN**

Lloyd was still boasting and taunting at Sam. "Give it up! There is no escape from the burn!"

Sam was all sweaty and nervous, having been burned so many times, even though they were just holograms, but she really couldn't lose this duel nor allow Lloyd to continue on his path of hate and vengeance. She knew there was one thing in her deck that would help her escape for certain. She just needed to draw correctly.

She drew her next card. "I activate, **_GRACEFUL CHARITY!_** Now I draw three cards, and discard two." After carrying this out, Sam found she got exactly what she needed to turn things around. "Hope you're in for something cool, because I play **_MONSTER REBORN!"_**

"You what?!" snarled Lloyd.

"Oh, yes, and I'm going to special summon one monster I just threw out with my draw; **_GREEN SPY-GIRL!"_**

**_(Atk: 2300)_**

Lloyd was ever surprised to see Sam had a monster that looked exactly like her; one that he had never seen before. "What does that card do?" he asked.

The corner of Sam's eye twinkled "While it's still my main-phase one, I can pay one half of my life points."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 950 VS Lloyd: 7200_**

"…and you can say goodbye to every spell and trap you have in play!"

Lloyd gasped in shock as all his cards went up in smoke. "Of course, my spy can't attack when she used her power, but I don't need her too." said Sam "Now I reveal my facedown monster; **_MERMAID KNIGHT!"_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

"And next up, I'll sacrifice my 7 Colored Fish, and summon one of the great legends of the sea; **_THE LEGENDARY FISHERMAN!"_**

**_(Atk: 1850)_**

Though Sam's monsters were still being affected, with the Gravity Bind card gone, she was free to attack, "And I think I know where to start…" she said as she eyed at Little Chimera and ordered her Mermaid to destroy it!

**_(Atk: 1500) VS (Atk: 900)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 950 VS Lloyd: 6600_**

"My Chimera!" cried Lloyd. Without it, he lost his fire power bonus, his Baseball kid lost another 1000 attack points, and Sam's Umi card weakened all the monsters further.

**_(Atk: 1300)_**

**_(Atk: 1200)_**

"Oh, and I should tell you another thing; as long as my Umi card is in play, my Mermaid can attack again on the same turn!"

Lloyd gasped, and watched in horror as Sam destroyed his Solar Flare Dragon!

**_(Atk: 1500) VS (Atk: 1300)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 950 VS Lloyd: 6300_**

Now all he had left was his baseball kid, and it was pretty much a wimp up at bat. "Let's see him knock this out of the park. Go Fisherman!"

**_(Atk: 1850) VS (Atk: 500)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 950 VS Lloyd: 4950_**

"And finally, to keep myself on my feet, I'll activate **_DIAN KETO THE CURE MASTER, _**to boost my life points by 1000."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 1950 VS Lloyd: 4950_**

Lloyd was now completely defenseless and after all he had done throughout the match. _"I can't believe she's making such a comeback."_ He thought silently. _"She's got a lot more fire in her senses than I thought. But she better not think I'm out of this yet."_

"Impressive work, Sam, but I'm still not through, yet. I've got plenty of fire left in me not even your entire water empire can douse!" He drew his next card, and then wickedly gazed up at Sam. "I think it's time to introduce you to my rarest, most powerful monsters." he said.

"Bring it on, I'm ready for it!" said Sam, and her army of monsters stood by her side, but Lloyd shook his head "I doubt very much you are. This new monster will put such a burn on you it will scar you for life. However, I need to prepare a sacrifice for it, so I'll remove form my graveyard one U.F.O Turtle, and special summon **_INFERNO!"_**

**_(Atk: 1100) _****_à (Atk: 900)_**

"And I'm still not finished… Next I activate, **_SNATCH STEAL!"_**

Sam had never seen that card before, and was horrified to see Lloyd equip onto her Green Spy Girl, and taking total control of her. "Looks I still know how to get girls to come to me." Lloyd sneered "And now, I sacrifice both my monsters in a great blaze…!" while he spoke, his side of the dueling field blazed with such raging infernos and flares as he summoned forth his strongest monster. "Behold, the master of all flames; **_INFERNAL FLAME EMPEROR!"_**

**_(Atk: 2700) _****_à (Atk: 2500)_**

This new monsters looked as if it was made of fire itself, almost too bright and hot to look at, but that wasn't the worst part of it. "Now I'll show you his special power." said Lloyd "When my emperor is tribute summoned, I can remove up to five fire monsters form my graveyard, and then destroy all spells and traps you have out in play!"

Sam gasped, and Lloyd only needed to remove one monster from, destroying Umi, and the Tornado Wall went with it as the two were linked. With the waters now gone, and all the monsters' powers back to normal, Sam was in very deep trouble. "It's over for you, Sam. Flame Emperor, attack her Mermaid!"

**_(Atk: 2700) VS (Atk: 1500)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 750 VS Lloyd: 4950_**

Thank goodness Sam had increased her score on her last move or she would have surely been beaten with that last attack! Lloyd was now only one attack away from victory, but he still acted as if that last attack had hurt him more than it did for Sam. "I'm going to do it! I'm going to burn you! I will! I must!"

"Lloyd, stop it!" cried Sam "Can't you see you're going insane…!"

"Am I?!" growled Lloyd "Well, maybe I am, but once I beat you and put the burn on your face the way you burned me off all those years ago, maybe things will get better."

Sam protested that it wouldn't help him. All it would do is strengthen his obsession for bitter vengeance and hatred, and before long he'd really go too far unless he stopped immediately. "You want me to stop, you'll have to do it yourself!" he hissed.

"If that's the way it has to be, I will!"

Lloyd still couldn't believe how much confidence Sam had. The odds against her were so bad that even a child could see it would take a miracle for her to pull out of this, and that was exactly what Sam was thinking as well. With only one card in her hand and her Fisherman still out, she needed to draw something good. She placed her hand over her deck and slowly drew out her card and looked at it, and realized maybe there was still hope for her, and for Lloyd.

"Here goes, I summon **_STAR BOY!"_**

**_(Atk: 550)_**

"A star…?" Lloyd asked in confusion "You waste your time to summon a monster like that!"

Sam assured him it was a very special monster, because it acted like a Little Chimera of her own, only Water monsters gained 500 attack points, and fire monsters lost 400. So her monsters got stronger…

**_(Atk: 550) _****_à (Atk: 1050)_**

**_(Atk: 1850) _****_à (Atk: 2250)_**

And Flame Emperor was burned off a bit…

**_(Atk: 2700) _****_à (Atk: 2300)_**

"A good move, Sam, but not good enough! You may have weakened my Emperor, but he is still far stronger than your monsters."

"Maybe so…" said Sam "But I've always wondered when I was little, what happened when you combine water with heat? The answer is steam!

Lloyd didn't understand what she was getting at, and what this had to do with the present situation. "Ah, unless?!"

"Unless is right…!" snapped Sam "I play this, and it's something you're going to have; **_CHANGE OF HEART!"_**

Lloyd gasped as Sam took control of his only monster, though it was still weak, it didn't matter. "Since you like to blow off so much steam, I'll show you what it's all about now!" snarled Sam, and she ordered all monsters to attack, and Lloyd was all wiped out in a wave of fire, water, and steam!

**_FINAL-SCORE:_**

**_Sam: 750 VS Lloyd: "0000"_**

"I win!" Sam said sharply.

Lloyd shakily looked up over his arms. "I lost to you!" he groaned softly "But I came so close!" He fell to his knees in shame and pounded the ground, hurting his hand a bit.

Sam approached him gently. "Come on; don't beat yourself up like this. You gave it your best, but it for the wrong reasons, and that's what really made you lose."

Lloyd looked up at her as Sam continue to explain that he let the rage and the fires consume him, and that he was so desperate for revenge and hurting her that he couldn't think clearly. "You need to get yourself out of this fire you've built around you."

"But… what if I get burned again? I don't want that to happen to Me." said Lloyd.

"Who else doesn't want it?" Sam asked "I know I don't, and while it would be fun to get a little payback, is it all really that worth it, especially if you can try to make things better instead of worse."

Lloyd really didn't know if he could trust her words, or tell which was way was right to go anymore. Sam understood where he was getting at. Some people could get better from these sorts of problems, but some couldn't, but she did know that whatever happened would be up to him.

Lloyd stood up, and he felt really tired from blowing off all that energy in the duel, and decided he would try, and he would start by accepting his defeat and gave Sam one keycard piece as agreed, and his Infernal Flame Emperor. Even if it was useless in Sam's deck, he wanted her to take it nonetheless. "Maybe it will help me and my deck if I turned down the heat a little."

Then he just turned and walked slowly away, and Sam kept her eye on him until he was completely out of sight. "Good luck, Lloyd." she said softly, and she gazed down at his emperor card.


	16. The Challenge

**CHAPTER SIXTEEN**

It was coming close to midafternoon…

Mandy was on fire at the tournament, crushing every opponent that crossed her path. Some she even crushed in devastating, and humiliating One Turn Kills, without even playing her special card, and already she had plenty of keycard pieces enough to make three, but she was dueling for the power, and she was searching for something special.

Ever since she heard Marik and Ishizu, speaking through Draco, while she didn't believe in all the magic hocus pocus, she wanted to find those two remaining Egyptian God Cards, and kept imagining how incredible it would be if she had them all in her deck. She'd be unbeatable, and no one would stand in her way again.

She knew that someone in Duel City was holding it, as Marik and Ishizu had said, but sadly, not a single opponent she faced had any of the two cards. Some of the rare cards she got, she scoffed at, and only kept just to make the losers feel hurt.

The more she dueled, the more conceited she became. As she walked through the city she grumpily thought of how lame every single challenger was, but she didn't allow herself to be discouraged. She already qualified for the finals, but she wasn't going to give up until she found those cards. "And when I find them, I'll find you, Mykan!"

Meanwhile, the spies had met up after a long while. Clover and Sam had both completed their keycards, but poor Alex was still shy one piece. "Great! I'm the only one who's still out." she moaned.

"Cheer up, Alex. You only need one more duel." said Clover.

"Besides, there are still plenty of duelists left in the city." added Sam. "Don't forget, we still have to find Mykan and Sabrina too."

Remembering about me and Sabrina perked Alex's spirits back up, but her features changed to concern. "I'm worried about them. You think they've run into any more trouble?"

They all remembered that threat when we last heard from Marik and Ishizu, a rare hunter with one of those Egyptian God Card was lurking somewhere in the city just waiting to strike. It shivers up their spines. "Okay, we seriously need to chillax here." said Clover "Mykan's tough. No way is he going to lose it."

The others did share that thought, "But how much do we really know about these cards?" asked Sam "What if they unleashed something… I don't know; dangerous when they're played?"

None of them said anything else after that.

…

Meanwhile, baby Erica began to cry again, from lack of proper nourishment, usually which came from breastfeeding, and of course, Ishizu couldn't do that, not being the biological mother of the child. So, she put Erica on bottle formulas, but couldn't get her to drink as the baby would get fussy as she wanted the comfort of her real mother.

Ishizu finally lost patience and knew the only way to get Erica to eat. "Forgive me, my child." but she activated her Millennium Ring and possessed Erica's mind, forcing her to drink from her bottle.

By the time she finished, Erica was quieter now that she had some proper nourishment and essential goods for her. "It will take time, but you will come to accept me as your provider and caregiver." she said softly.

"I certainly hope it will be sooner than later, Ishizu." said Marik. He wasn't being rude or short or anything else unpleasant. He really meant it, wanting his sister to be as happy as he wanted to be.

"The happiness we both seek will soon be ours, my brother." said Ishizu as she moved back to her throne. "The time has come for me to challenge Mykan to the duel that even he has no hope of winning."

Her brother joined her by her side. "Using one of our two Egyptian God Cards is a clever move, sister."

Despite the two were fully confident that their plan wouldn't fail this time, Marik had a small backup prepared just in case, but Ishizu was hoping that would not happen. "Once I defeat Mykan, he will be forced to be mine, and then you will be free to take his soon to be ex-wife for yourself, my brother."

Marik snickered sinisterly "Yes, and also we mustn't forget our other objective; obtaining the third Egyptian God Card. Once we possess all three, we will be able to bring the world to its knees, and all will bow before us."

The two siblings chuckled sinisterly, and then Ishizu activated her Millennium Ring "Awaken my mind slave…!"

…

Deep within Duel City, from within a dark dank alley, the Millennium Symbol appeared in the shadows, and a pair of sinister eyes opened wide beneath it as Ishizu called out, "Awaken, and seek out Mykan!"

Then out of the shadows, a young girl dressed in a rare hunter's uniform rushed out form the alley so suddenly, frightening people near the ally entrance, and she even ran past the spies so quickly. "What was that?" asked Alex.

The others hadn't the slightest clue.

…

Meanwhile, Sabrina and I were moving back to the city, the both us had a few more duels; all against rare hunters, and all of which lost to us. By now, Sabrina had completed her keycard, and I only needed one more piece to complete mine before I qualified for the finals too.

The finals! Where, hopefully, we would find Marik and Ishizu and face them directly and get Erica back, but we also needed to find the spies too. "I hope they've gotten all their keycards." I said.

"I'm sure they have. You taught them all well." said Sabrina "It makes me proud of you."

I smiled at her and held her hand firmly but gently. Still, we knew we weren't safe, not as long as Marik and Ishizu still had more rare hunters out there; especially that one particular hunter was racing towards now. Even without my Millennium Necklace, I could feel the danger was imminent.

Suddenly, we felt something whizz by. "What was that?" snapped Sabrina.

"You heard it too…" I said, and then that same whizz zoomed by us again. "Show yourself!" I shouted. Then finally, the rare hunter girl leapt out and onto the road before us. "Ah, Mykan Jaden; I've finally found you." she hissed.

From the looks of the Millennium Symbol on her head, there was no second guessing it; "Ishizu…!" I snarled, and sure enough, her image appeared right behind the girl, snickering. "Greetings, Mykan. Meet my latest rare hunter, Karina, and with the power of my Millennium Ring, I've taken control of her and will force her to duel through my eyes."

Hearing her say that made my blood turn cold "Coward! Monster…! It's bad enough you hide behind your mind puppets, now you're going about snatching people off the streets to do your dirty work?"

Ishizu really saw no difference. With her magic, she could hear and see everything that was happening, as well as control Karina as if she were dueling in person. "Now prepare to duel me, Mykan, and to become mine forever."

Sabrina clenched her fist "That will never happen, Ishizu."

"Funny, I don't recall asking for your permission, nor your opinion." said Ishizu "It is Mykan whom I'm interested in, and once he loses this duel, he will soon become my husband as he was meant to be, while you'll be forced to marry my brother."

It was getting harder for me to keep my cool, but I knew I had to duel, especially if it meant gaining the last keycard piece I needed to enter the finals, and if I didn't duel, I didn't want to begin to think what would happen to little Erica. "Very well, Ishizu. I'll duel you, but rest assured you will fail just like all your rare hunters did."

Ishizu laughed at my remark "You won't succeed this time, for this is the duel that I promised you would fail at. For I plan to take you out with a power you cannot hope to stand up against; my Egyptian God Card!"

Sabrina felt worried already, and the match hadn't even started, but she could tell there was no stopping me. "Don't worry, dear. I can do this." I said to her. Sabrina nodded and pecked me long and hard on the cheek for luck, which greatly angered Ishizu to see.

_"Enjoy the time you have left!" _she growled in her thoughts _"Your marriage about to be severed at the hands of a monster neither of you have faced!"_

I stood tall and ready to face her, as we prepared our disks and life points. _"…DUEL!"_

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_Once again, I ask you all to remember the TIME APPROPRIATION and of the rules of cards in our world. I will only the effects of the God Cards as was seen in the anime._**

**_To be honest, it really sickens me that some of OUR cards don't follow the effects in the anime, making it more difficult to write duels_**


	17. Super Strategies: Part 1

**CHAPTER SEVENTEEN**

The scores were set…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8000 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"Let the countdown to your destruction begin." Ishizu hissed as she forced Karina to draw her cards. "I'll go first then, and I'll place one card facedown. Now I summon forth **_HUMANOID SLIME_** in defense mode!"

**_(Def: 2000)_**

Her first move looked pretty obvious to me, but then again sometimes the obvious wasn't accurate. So I decided to play it safe as I drew my first card "I'll also place one card face down on the field, and now I summon **_GAMMA THE MAGNET WARRIOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

"That ends my turn."

Ishizu scoffed and ridiculed at me for not doing much on my first move. "Allow me to show you some real dueling, by activating this continuous trap; **_SOLEMN WISHES! _**This trap will increase my life points by 500 for every time I draw any cards, such as right now…"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8500 VS Mykan: 8000_**

_"The first part of my plan is already in motion." _she said in her mind _"But for now, I must keep Mykan from gaining any advantages that could stop me."_

"My next card shall be **_POLYMERIZATION_**, which I used to merge my Slime with a **_WORM DRAKE_** in my hand to create the **_HUMANOID WORM DRAKE!"_**

**_(Atk: 2100)_**

I glared at the new monster, and Ishizu ordered it to attack. "Hold on, Ishizu…" I snapped at her "Your two monsters may be strong as one, but now I activate my facedown card; **_DE-FUSION! _**It will split both your monsters up into the two monsters it was made of."

**_(Atk: 800)_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

Ishizu growled "A clever move, Mykan."

"Why thank you." I said with a cheeky smirk as I drew my next card. "Now to help wipe out your monsters, I summon **_ALPHA THE MAGNET WARRIOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 1400)_**

"Your two monsters will not stand up to the power of my warriors, Ishizu!" I ordered Alpha to destroy Humanoid Slime, and Gamma to destroy the Worm Drake, dealing Ishizu 700 points of damage.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"Yes!" Sabrina cried, cheering for my triumph "Well done, darling!"

I turned and smiled at her, but the duel was far from over, and it was Ishizu's turn. "A very impressive comeback, Mykan, but even with your slight lead you'll never defeat the real surprises my deck will shower you with."

"Then make your move, Ishizu, and we'll see." I said "So far all you've done is bore me by playing inferior beasts."

"I assure you, my strategies yet to come are like none you've ever seen." said Ishizu. "First I shall draw a card, and receive 500 life points from my Solemn Wishes!"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

She gazed down at the card she drew and nodded at it. "The time has come to put the second part of my plan into operation; for I am about to call forth a creature that cannot be so easily destroyed."

"What do you mean _can't be easily destroyed?" _I asked with extreme curiosity.

"You shall see! Now behold the power of my latest shape shifting creature know as **_REVIVAL JAM!"_**

**_(Def: 500)_**

This new monster looked really gross; it almost made Sabrina sick just looking at it. "What is that thing?" she wondered, and I wondered the same thing. "Behold, a monster unlike any other. Having no solid mass and being made entirely of plasmatic slime." said Ishizu. "Not even your most powerful monsters can shatter it. When played the right way it's one of the most excellent of defenses one can have."

"We'll see…" I said "While I admit your monster seems all brand new, I don't believe your new slime monster is as all powerful as you claim."

"Then attack it, and find out!" hissed Ishizu.

"Very well then…" I said as I drew my next card, and I ordered my Alpha to attack, and in a blinding swing of his sword, Revival Jam was splattered. "So much for you so called unbeatable monster…" I gloated "Now that you're wide open, Go Gamma; attack her life points now!"

My magnet warrior dashed straight for Karina and bashed hard, sending her skidding on her feet a few inches backwards, and a full 1500 points was lost to her.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 6800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

Ishizu glared at me furiously, while Sabrina leapt for joy and I stood proud and smug. "I was expecting a real challenge form you, Ishizu, but so far all you've done is waste my time."

Ishizu was not the least bit discouraged and was even laughing at me. "What's so funny?" I asked her. "I just find it amusing how delude yourself into believing you can actually win this. Before long, this duel will be over, along with your marriage to your princess!"

"That will never happen, Ishizu!" I snarled at her "No matter what tricks you unleash, you'll never defeat me or breakup my marriage." I gazed over at my wife, and she nodded in agreement with me, but Ishizu promised us "If you only knew what devastating powers my ultimate strategy will bring, you'd reconsider."

She drew her card and gained her life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"But now observe as I pay 1000 of those points, and summon a familiar shape to rejoin my forces!"

"What?" I snapped as I saw her pay her points…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 6300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

And there one the field, blue slime was oozing up from the ground and there it stood. "It's Revival Jam!" I cried. It all made sense now when Ishizu told me of its special ability whenever it got destroyed in battle. "Each time you destroy it, I'll simply re-summon it again, and again, and before long you will be at the mercy of a monster like no other still; my Egyptian God Card."

I couldn't allow that to happen. I wouldn't let it happen, but it was still Ishizu's turn. "Now I'll place one card facedown, and I'll summon this creature; **_CHANGE SLIME!"_**

**_(Def: 300)_**

A very weak a feeble monster- I could see her strategy all the way. "You're planning to summon enough monsters to sacrifice so you can summon your Egyptian God Card."

"Correct, Mykan, and when I do, you'll be at the end of your ropes." hissed Ishizu "And I to complete my turn, I'll throw this continuous spell card into play; **_THE DARK DOOR! _**This card makes it so we both may only attack with one monster per turn."

It was now my turn and I drew my card, and it was obvious to me what I had to do; stop her from gaining enough monsters to sacrifice. "Sorry Ishizu, but even though I can only attack you once this turn, that should be all that I need to disrupt your strategy by wiping out your monsters."

I ordered Gamma to attack Change Slime, and he dove right for the weakling. "Stop right there!" snarled Ishizu, "I activate a continuous trap in combination with my Revival Jam; **_JAM DEFENDER!"_**

I would have asked what the trap did, but I got my answer immediately as I saw Revival Jam leap in the way of my magnet warrior, taking the hit and was splattered. "Sorry, Mykan, but thanks to my newest trap, Revival Jam can now act as a shield for any attack your monsters wage against mine."

Both Sabrina and I could see this was starting to get serious. I wasted my one attack for the turn, and didn't cause Ishizu much damage or trouble, and on her next turn she'd bring Revival Jam back again. "Come on, Mykan! Don't give up. There must be something you can do." Sabrina called to me. I knew there had to be some way, but for now I merely summoned a monster in defense-mode and ended my turn.

Ishizu snickered as she drew her next card, got her life points, but then re-summoned Revival Jam.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 5800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"My next card shall be the spell, **_POT OF GREED_**, allowing me to draw two more cards, and boost my life points once more."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 6300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"Now I shall place the **_LIQUID BEAST_** in defense-mode!"

**_(Def: 800)_**

"And finally, to ensure you stay put for a while longer, **_NIGHTMARE STEELCAGE!"_**

Instantly, I was caged in a large trap like a common mouse. "Mykan!" cried Sabrina. "No! I'm trapped!" I growled. As long as the cage was in play, neither duelist was allowed to attack, and worse yet, all Ishizu needed was one more monster and she would have everything she needed. "Your time is running out, Mykan." she hissed at me "In just one more turn I should have all that I require to summon my all-powerful beast, and you will be completely powerless to do anything about it."

"When last I checked, this duel was still on, Ishizu." I said to her. I drew my card, but I was in a really tough spot. I was hoping to end the duel before Ishizu came too far in her plan, and so I decided then to prepare a strong defense. "I place two cards facedown, and now I sacrifice my two magnet warriors to summon one of my newer monsters; **_BUSTER BLADER!"_**

**_(Atk: 2600)_**

Ishizu was slightly impressed "A very impressive monster, but I'm afraid it won't spare you from the ultimate powers you are about to witness."

Sabrina was starting to lose her nerves, but not as much as I was as we both watched Ishizu draw her card and gain life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 6800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

Ishizu then burst out laughing very loud and powerful. "The time has come. I activate **_MONSTER REBORN_** and I'll use it to revive my Humanoid Slime!"

**_(Def: 2000)_**

"This can't be! She's succeeded in getting three monsters!" I cried.

The skies grew dark overhead. "I now have all that I need." Ishizu shouted "The field shall be shrouded in darkness to welcome out the final beast you will ever see." She paused for a moment glaring me down and then she raised the last card in her hand up high "I sacrifice, Humanoid Slime, Liquid Beast and Change Slime…!"

The skies rattled with lightning and thunder as the grounds quaked and the winds stirred up. "Here it comes!" Sabrina cried as we all looked up and there it was slowly descending down to the field. "And there it is!" shouted Ishizu "My ultimate fighting weapon; the Egyptian God, **_SLIFER THE SKY DRAGON!"_**

I was so memorized by the sight of the enormous monster I could hardly blink my eyes. "How can I stop it?" I wondered aloud, and the huge dragon roared right at me, blasting the shockwave winds straight at me.

"Mykan…!" Sabrina shrieked, and Ishizu continued to laugh and shouted "The end of your marriage is now!"

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	18. Super Strategies: Part 2

**CHAPTER EIGHTEEN**

The huge dragon continued to glare me down, and Ishizu was getting way too cocky as she continued to gloat that I was finished, and in all honesty, having never actually seen this card in play before, and with nothing in the books about it, I didn't know what to expect or how powerful it was going to be, but most of all how to stop it.

"Allow me to explain how my Egyptian God Card works." Ishizu said "The number of cards that I hold will determine my monsters attack and defense power. Each card I hold grants him 1000 attack and defense points."

That much was clear, but I could see clearly that Ishizu's hand was totally emptied. Not a single card. "Without any cards in your hand, your dragon may be big and powerful, but it hasn't a single attack point." I said aloud "Your so-called Egyptian God Card is no real threat."

"We'll soon see." hissed Ishizu.

"Be careful, Mykan!" Sabrina called out to me. "I still believe in you. I know you can do this!"

"I'll do all that I can." I said. I drew my card, but really there wasn't much I could do. My Buster Blader was stronger than Slifer, but I was still stuck in the cage, and it wouldn't vanish until I ended my turn. I just had to hope for the better and that things would work out for me, but I had no choice to pass my turn.

"As you wish." hissed Ishizu, and as she snickered, the magical cage around me began to evaporate, leaving me exposed for the battle about to commence. Ishizu drew her card, and her life points went up…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

Plus, Slifer gained 1000 attack points, but rather than hang onto what she drew, Ishizu played her card right away. "I now activate the continuous spell **_(CARD OF SAFE RETURN!")_** The power of this spell will allow me to draw three new cards when monsters are special summoned from our graveyards."

She ended her turn immediately, and now my chance had come. I quickly drew my card and warned Ishizu that her dragon still had no attack power. "Your Egyptian God Card is about to fall at the hands of my monsters. Go Buster Blader!" My mother dove straight for her dragon, but Ishizu scoffed at me. "Don't tell me you've forgotten; Revival Jam will intercept all your attacks!"

I gasped, realizing that I had forgotten in all the chaos and center focus, but it was too late to call of my attack as my Blader had splattered Revival Jam. "Oh no! What have I done?" I cried.

"Done…?" hissed Ishizu "What you've done is help me immensely." With my turn over, Ishizu drew her card giving her dragon 1000 attack points and herself another 500 life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

"Of course, since you destroyed Revival Jam, at a cost of 1000 life points, I can re-summon it back to the field."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 6800 VS Mykan: 8000_**

**_(Def: 500)_**

"Plus, thanks to my Card of Safe Return, I may draw three new cards, which not only raises my life points again, but boosts my Sky Dragon's power to 4000!"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7300 VS Mykan: 8000_**

This was bad for me, very bad! "Oh, my; it's already nearly twice as strong as my Buster Blader!"

Ishizu snickered. "It's about time for me and my Egyptian God Card to show you the true meaning of power." and she ordered her dragon to attack my Blader. "Just what I thought you'd do!" I said.

"What?!" snapped Ishizu.

"Activate **_MIRROR FORCE! _**This trap will intercept your Sky Dragon's attack and destroy all monsters in attack position." The blast had hit my Buster Blader, and the Mirror Force card looked ready to intercept, but much to my horror, the blast shattered right through my trap and destroyed my monster. "No! It can't be?!"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7300 VS Mykan: 5600_**

Sabrina couldn't believe it either. "The trap didn't work? How is this possible?"

Ishizu laughed at us both. "It's not quite that simple. I'm afraid the both of you have much to learn about the power of Egyptian God Monsters; for they possess extraordinary powers that shield them against the effects of many different cards, making them useless."

This was terrible news, and it only got worse as it soon became clear that the god cards couldn't be destroyed specifically by card effects, except by other god cards, spell cards would only last one turn on them, and if they were special summoned from the graveyard, they would go right back again at the end of the turn.

Now what was I supposed to do?

…

The spies had been searching all over the city, but they couldn't find any signs of me, Sabrina, or a final challenge for Alex. Not a single of the remaining duelists she had found had the one keycard piece she was missing. Sam and Clover still offered to give her one of their shards and challenge the other duelists themselves to regain that piece, but Alex opposed wholeheartedly to just the thought.

"Look girls, I know you're trying to help me, but what good would that do?" she said to them "It wouldn't be as cool as earning it myself."

"But Alex, there's no way we're going to the finals without you." said Clover "Remember what we promised Mykan and the princess?"

"Yeah, but that's just It." replied Alex "I can't just slip my way through, it goes against everything I learned from Mykan."

Sam understood what she was getting at "We do owe Mykan quite a bit. We wouldn't be the top duelists today if not for his teachings."

Clover tried and tried to find a way to protest, but ultimately had to agree with her friends. I chose them as my personal and private apprentices because I believed in them and their skills; the very skills they used to help me get Sabrina back and defeat the evil Aswad controlling her father.

Alex stood tall and proud "So you see I'm not going to do this the easy way. I'm going to fight my way up to the top myself and really prove my worth to myself and to Mykan."

"That you're as lame as you are brainless." hissed an annoying voice. The girls turned and saw Mandy standing there. "Who asked you for an opinion, Mandy?" Alex sneered.

"Yeah, and hello… having a private moment here." added Clover.

Mandy scoffed "This happens to be a public place, as in I could overhear your pathetic preaches just like everyone else."

The girls were starting to lose their patience, but Mandy felt delighted to see them losing it and decided to tease them some more by showing them all the full assembled keycards she had with her, much to the spies shock. "You won all those?!" cried Sam.

"Please! More like demanded them." said Mandy "These losers could duel their ways out of cardboard boxes, just like you wimps."

Clover's head throbbed in anger "Wimps?! Uh, hello… we're the ones who always clean you out in duels."

Sam and Alex snickered remembering all those good times, which made Mandy's face turn red "You only did that because of Mykan always bailing you out. Why else would he have made you his students… because he has no faith in you at all."

Now all three of them felt their honors were shattered. "Girls, I think I found my challenge." Alex sneered as she glared at Mandy dead in the eyes, and she glared back at her. "You wanna duel, it'll be a pleasure." Mandy said "And once I crush you I'll be one step closer to showing you losers up for the fraud's you are!"

"Kick her butt, Alex." Clover cheered.

"Show her who's the boss." added Sam.

Alex and Mandy stood ready to prepare their disks to duel, when suddenly they could hear the sounds of the people in the city stammer over the strange sights on the horizon. The spies looked and saw the small part of town covered in dark stormy clouds which Sam already could tell were not natural. "What is that?" she asked.

"I thought you knew." said Clover.

Mandy, seemed to be the only who knew what it was. "…An Egyptian God Card." she muttered softly. She just had to check this out and ran off. "Hey!" snapped Alex.

"I'll settle with you dweebs later!" she shouted as she ran towards the darkness. The spied didn't want to miss this either, and all had bad feelings about it. So they ran after Mandy.

…

Meanwhile, Ishizu's Egyptian God Card was still glaring at me. "Make your move, Mykan. Slifer is growing impatient as am I."

"Very well; my draw…!" I said as I drew my fifth card. So far, with what little information I knew about the sky dragon, it didn't make it all the more easy to stop it, but I did have a clue how I could try. Slifer's attack power depended on how many cards the player held, and with the six card limit rule, it gave me an outside chance and I idea how to beat Slifer. I just hoped it would work.

"I sacrifice my facedown monster in order to summon this; my **_DARK MAGICIAN GIRL!"_**

**_(Atk: 2000)_**

Ishizu stepped forth "By summoning a new monster, you have triggered my dragon's special ability; it's second mouth!"

The sky dragon's second set of jaws opened wide and were glowing with power, and Ishizu explained that when any new monster was summoned or set on my side of the field in his presence, Slifer would automatically attack them and drain that monster of 2000 points of which mode it was in. "And since your Dark Magician Girl has 2000 points exactly, she'll be wiped out in the blast!"

"No! This can't be!" I cried.

Sabrina trembled with fear "Mykan." she muttered.

"Slifer, unleash your fury now!" shouted Ishizu, and Slifer fired at my Dark Magician Girl, colliding in a bright explosion. I braced myself struggling to keep on my feet, while Ishizu laughed herself silly. "Your monster is vanquished."

"Guess… again…!" I shouted.

"What?"

As the light and smoke faded, my Dark Magician Girl was still standing. "It can't be!" cried Ishizu "No one defies the power of my sky dragon."

I smirked at her cheekily "Except me and the power of my **_RUSH RECKLESSLY _**card played straight from my hand. It made my Dark Magician girl 700 attack points stronger, giving her the power to withstand your dragon's attack."

Ishizu growled in outrage, while Sabrina sighed in heavy relief. True my Magician was weak now, but she'd get all her power back at the end of the turn. "Now to continue, I'll give my Magician girl the **_MEGAMORPH _**card, which will double her attack power and I'll place one card facedown. My turn is done."

"Ha! This duel is over for you as well, Mykan. So is your marriage." hissed Ishizu as she drew her next card. She gained life points, and Slifer gained another 1000 attack points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 5600_**

**_(Atk: 5000)_**

…But since her turn was over, my Dark Magician girl not only gained all her attack points back, but my Megamorph card doubled her attack power to 4000. Ishizu didn't really mind. "The time has come to put the final part of my strategy into play, and will render my dragon's power virtually limitless!"

Sabrina and I didn't like the sound of that. "Now, Mykan observe this; the continuous spell **_INFINITE CARDS!_** This nullifies the six card limitation, and allows us both to hold as many cards as we wish in our hands."

My mouth hung open in shock. With no limit to how many hand cards, who knew how strong Slifer would get; unless my plan worked. Already, by playing one card from her hand, Ishizu made Slifer's attack go down to 4000 again matching my Dark Magician Girl's power, but Ishizu knew this and was ready for it. "I'll activate the spell card **_SALVAGE!"_** Slifer lost another thousand attack points with that move, but thanks to Salvage card, Ishizu was able to get two of the water monsters in her graveyard and put them in her hand, raising Slifer's attack back to 5000!

"And now, Mykan, prepare to feel the wrath of the gods! Slifer, I command you, destroy his Dark Magician Girl!"

Slifer opened his huge jaws ready to fire at me, and it was now or never. "Hold on, I activate my trap card, **_LIGHTFORCE SWORD!"_**

Ishizu gasped, as the holographic sword appeared. "Now my magical sword will attack your hand and banish one card form play, weakening your sky dragon by 1000 points." My sword attacked and Ishizu lost one card out of her hand. "No!" she shouted, but it was too late to call off her attack.

"Our monster's attack powers are evenly matched…" I said "Which means both our monsters will be destroyed. Go Dark Magician girl; counterattack!" My monster obeyed and leapt straight up for Slifer. It looked as if it was going to work, when suddenly Revival Jam leapt in my monster's way again, sacrificing itself. "It… it can block a counterattack?"

"Very observant, Mykan." hissed Ishizu "Once again, your attempts to destroy my dragon were in vain, and since the number of monsters have changed, my attack can be replayed, but first I activate from my hand the quick-play spell, **_MYSTICAL SPACE TYPHOON!"_**

She used it to destroy my Megamorph card, returning my Dark Magician Girl's power to normal, and Slifer easily destroyed her.

**_(Atk: 3000) VS (Atk: 2000)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 4600_**

I couldn't believe it! I just stood there with my eyes open wide. Sabrina felt the same. "Mykan, No!" she cried under her breath.

Ishizu, however, remained as smug and as boastful as ever. All hope was rapidly fading for me. I could see it all now. She'd draw on her next turn, and then bring back Revival Jam which would let her draw three more cards, and in four turns my Lightforce sword would give her back the card I slashed out.

"Behold!" said Ishizu "I have created the ultimate seven card combination that makes me completely indestructible! With each passing turn I will continue to grow stronger, while you will continue to suffer at the hands of my Egyptian God Card. Then…" the image of Ishizu showed her cheeks turning a soft pink. "…Mykan…you and I will be together forever."

Overcome with fear, shame, and loss of heart, I fell to my knees and bowed my head staring shamefully at the ground. "I… can't… let her win!" I muttered "What… can I do?"

Sabrina could feel and was sharing my pain and shock. Every last nerve and bone in her body was shaking and cold. Tears were streaking down her cheek. "Mykan… please don't give up!" she peeped.

Suddenly, a voice called out to me. "Quit the dramatics, Mykan!"

I looked up and I couldn't believe my eyes. "Mandy?"

She glared down at me and scoffed "Is this the guy who beat me before. I don't think so. So do us all a favor and get up and duel!"

**_To Be Continued…!_**

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_While I'm not too sure Revival Jam and Jam Defender can really stand up to counterattacks, I had to do what I had to do. _**


	19. Super Strategies: Final Part

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_I researched for the special move, but all results were inconclusive with what I really wanted to know, but I think that at least in the anime this would be accurate._**

**CHAPTER NINETEEN**

I couldn't believe what I just heard; Mandy was trying to give me confidence. "Come on, Mykan. If really were the greatest dueling champ, then surely you can beat this creep and take her Egyptian God Card."

The spies suddenly arrived on the scene, and they skidded to a grinding halt at the sight of Slifer. "Whoa! Check it out!" cried Alex. "Look at the size of that monster!" added Sam. Clover shivered nervously.

"Well, it seems we've gathered quite a crowd." said Ishizu "Here to witness your downfall, Mykan."

I clenched my fist at that remark, and one by one, the spies offered me their support and believing, just like they did before. "Come on, Mykan; don't listen to this cloaked clown!" snarled Clover. "We believe in you, Mykan. It's not over until the last move is made." added Sam. Alex nodded "It's like you keep telling us, look carefully and consider all your options."

I gazed at the girls, and at Sabrina. She folded her hands and nodded proudly at me. Finally, Mandy shouted at me "Get up and finish her unless you're not the true guy I thought you were!" She secretly only wanted me to keep dueling so she could learn the secrets of Slifer the Sky Dragon, so she could later defeat it and take it for herself.

I was still unsure. I had never faced anything so powerful and devious. None of my attacks could get through, and even if they could, Slifer would only get stronger every turn, but finally I began to feel a bit of my strength returning, and I bolted upright onto my feet, much to Ishizu's outrage yet astonishment. "It's over, Ishizu!" I said sharply "You won't intimidate me any longer. I'll find some way to beat you."

"Ha! My Egyptian God Card thinks differently, Mykan." said Ishizu "Once my all powerful Slifer the Sky Dragon wipes you out, you'll lose this duel and your marriage to Sabrina. Then our marriage will commence shortly after." She then cast her gaze over at Mandy "And you, young Mandy. Don't think you're merely an innocent spectator in this game; for once I'm finished with Mykan, my brother and I are coming you and the Egyptian God Card you possess."

Mandy felt a little struck, but the rest of us turned to gaze at her in astonishing shock and confusion. "Mandy has an Egyptian God Card?" cried Clover. Mandy grabbed her deck and pulled out her card for all to see; Obelisk the Tormentor!

This explained everything, how Mandy had been crushing duelists so easily. "And to think, I almost would have faced that thing!" cried Alex.

Ishizu snickered wickedly, but Mandy wasn't impressed. "Listen here, I don't know what kind of weird tricks you're trying to pull, and I couldn't care less about Mykan or his nerd heard, but this card is mine, and your little threats don't scare me."

"They will in time, fool!" snapped Ishizu "You have no idea of the dangerous powers that you are wielding."

Mandy merely scoffed and ignored that comment. The spies had never seen her act like this before. It was even weirder than her usually snotty attitude. Nevertheless, my duel was still on, and it was my turn.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 4600_**

I drew my next card, and while I knew it would be rather dangerous to play at a time like this, if I wanted any chances to figure out how to beat Slifer, I had no choice. "Now I play **_(CARD OF SANCTITY!) _**It forces us both to draw until we are each holding six cards, Ishizu."

Ishizu snickered as be both drew our cards. "Thank you! You've just raised my Sky Dragon's power all the way to 6000 with your move, not to mention you boosted my life points thanks to my Solemn Wishes."

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8300 VS Mykan: 4600_**

The others were really nervous when they realized that. "Six thousand…! That's just crazy!" cried Sam. "Well, at least it let Mykan refresh his hand. Maybe he'll have a better chance now." said Alex.

Even with the cards that I drew, at least I'd have a chance to defend myself. "I place one card facedown, and I summon **_BIG SHEILD GARDNA_** in defense mode!"

**_(Def: 2600)_**

Ishizu snickered. "Don't tell me you've forgotten that summoning new monsters activates my dragon's special ability?" The others all watched as Slifer's second mouth blasted my monster. "What's going on?!" cried Clover.

The light from the attack had faded, and my monster was shaved of 2000 attack points, but still remained on the field. "My monster still stands." I said.

"But not for long." said Ishizu. It was her turn, and she drew her next card, which boosted Slifer up to 7000 attack points, and her life points even higher.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8800 VS Mykan: 4600_**

"Now then, since Revival Jam was destroyed, I'll pay 1000 life points and revive it right back…"

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 7800 VS Mykan: 4600_**

**_(Def: 500)_**

The spies felt really grossed out seeing the slimy monster reform itself. "I think I'm going to be sick." groaned Alex. Ishizu laughed at her remark "You may be sick, but I'll grow stronger. Thanks to my Card of Safe Return, I now can draw three more cards to raise my dragon another 3000 points."

**_(Atk: 10,000)_**

It also boosted up her life points again by 500…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8300 VS Mykan: 4600_**

"Oh, and one other thing… that card that you banished from hand before was a very special card; **_CARD FROM A DIFFERENT DIMESNION!"_**

I sweated nervously.

"No, not that!" cried Sabrina.

"What's that card do?" asked Sam, and Sabrina explained, that having copies of the card in her deck, "Whenever it's banished, that card automatically returns to your hand next turn, and both players draw two more cards."

"Correct you are, Princess." hissed Ishizu as she and I got our cards. Ishizu gained yet another 500 life points…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 8800 VS Mykan: 4600_**

…and now, with three new cards in her hand, Slifer the Sky Dragon's attack had risen to 13,000! Even Mandy was freaked out by all that. "It's already more than four times as strong as my Blue Eyes White Dragon!"

"Okay, this is just nuts here!" cried Clover "How is Mykan supposed to beat a monster that strong?"

"And it's only going to get stronger." said Sam "Mykan's opponent has Infinite Cards in play so she hold as many cards as she wants."

Ishizu snickered "It appears your friends are beginning to lose faith in you, Mykan. I know I would I were facing my Egyptian God Card down." She then ordered her dragon to attack, and my monster was shattered. "My monster was in defense-mode, so I take no damage."

"It doesn't matter to me." snapped Ishizu. "Your defenses will soon run out, and you'll be at the mercy of my all-powerful Sky Dragon. It's over for you, Mykan!"

My insides were shaking for the first time since… ever! How could I defeat something so powerful? Not a single card in my deck could come even close to matching Slifer's power, and the more cards Ishizu drew, the stronger it would get, but just then it hit me! _"Slifer will only get stronger as long as Ishizu keeps drawing cards."_ I said in my mind. My cheeky smug reappeared on my face "I've got the answer." I said "I'll use your own Egyptian God Card to destroy you for me."

Ishizu and the others looked puzzled. "Nonsense!" growled Ishizu "Weren't you listen to what I said before? An Egyptian God Monster is immune to most card effects, therefore you cannot control it."

"I'm afraid you're mistaken." I protested "There's still one final chance for me to end this duel and defeat you for good!"

I drew my card, and what luck, it was just what I needed. "Prepare for the end, Ishizu. First I activate, **_MONSTER REINCARNATION! _**Now by discarding one card form my hand, I can add one monster from the graveyard into my hand, and I choose to get back my Dark Magician Girl."

Ishizu didn't see what good that did me. "You waste your time reviving monsters I've already destroyed? Why not make it easier and surrender?"

"Because… I never give up, and I'm also about to win this match, and it all starts with this card, **_MONSTER REBORN!_** With it, I shall revive my Buster Blader!"

**_(Atk: 2600)_**

The others were all confused. "That's his big plan?" asked Alex. "I know, that monster may be cool and all, but that dragon is like, way too tough!" cried Clover. Sabrina and Sam however thought if this was all just part of my plan.

"I still can't see what you hope to accomplish by summoning all these monsters." said Ishizu "The only thing you're doing is assuring me victory. Especially considering you put monster in attack mode, and once I attack it, your life points will be all wiped out."

"You won't get the chance to, Ishizu." I said "Mark my words, this is the final turn of the duel, and my Buster Blader is going to attack you one last time."

"What?" snapped Ishizu, and the others gasped as well. "Mykan's going to do what?" cried Sam. Even Mandy thought I was being crazy. _"Mykan must be losing it. His puny blader won't even scratch that dragon." _Then suddenly, she had a feeling why I was really attacking…!

Ishizu, still not seeing through my plan, merely scoffed at me and said "Perhaps I should remind you of the flaws in your move- Firstly: Since you revived your Buster Blader, I may draw yet another three cards thanks to my Card of Safe Return."

"Yes, I know…" I snapped "Then your life points will increase, and Slifer the Sky Dragon gains another 3000 attack points."

"Precisely!" hissed Ishizu as she drew her cards, and her life points and Slifer's power both increased.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Ishizu/Karina: 9300 VS Mykan: 4600_**

**_(Atk: 16,000)_**

"And what's more, you summoned a new monster, thereby activating Slifer's second mouth which will drain your monster of 2000 attack points."

Slifer did just that and blasted at my monster, but as I pointed out "Buster blader is strong enough to survive, Ishizu." and he did survive with a mere attack of 600. "That's still all that I need. The time has come for me to strike down your Egyptian God Card for all the trouble it's caused me."

"What?!" snarled Ishizu, and I ordered my Blader to attack Slifer. "Mykan?!" shrieked Clover.

"I can't watch!" cried Alex.

As my monster dove straight at Slifer, Ishizu resisted the urge to counterattack. "You forget, your monster can't get anywhere near my dragon; not while I have my faithful Revival Jam to defend it."

She did exactly as I hoped, and forced my monster to attack Revival Jam, splattering it once again. "On my next turn I'll revive my monster, I'll draw more cards and then I'll finish you off for making such a foolish mistake, Mykan."

I just smiled cheekily "I'm afraid it's still my turn, Ishizu. I just merely did that last attack to let you have one final gloat before your downfall."

Ishizu felt confused again, and the spies didn't know how much more of this they could take. They just wanted me to get this over with and fast, but finally I was ready for my big move. "And now, Ishizu behold the instrument of your dragon's true downfall. I summon **_SPEAR CRETIN!"_**

**_(Atk: 500)_**

Everyone was expected something much bigger and scarier. Each offered me their disapproval of my move, except Sabrina and Mandy had the feeling they knew what I was up to, but still Ishizu was not impressed. "I'm losing my patience with you, Mykan. One way or another, I'm going take out your monster and the rest of your life points."

"Oh, really…?" I said as I noticed Slifer's second mouth was preparing for attack. "You've forgotten that since I've summoned a new monster, I've activated your dragon's special ability, forcing it to attack my Spear Cretin."

Slifer fired and its blasted headed straight at my monster "…And now the stage is set for my facedown card to activate; **_BOOK OF MOON!"_** Thanks to it, my monster was turned into facedown defense-mode, and even though it was being targeted by an effect, it was still practically being attacked, which meant it was flipped face-up again, and it was destroyed. "Now, you've activated my monster's ability, by flipping it up and destroying it, both players now may play one monster from their respective graveyards."

Ishizu re-summoned her Worm Drake in attack mode, and I summoned my new monster face down in defense mode. Ishizu was more delighted than confused. "You do realize since two monsters have been revived, that entitles me to draw six new cards."

"I'm quite aware of that." I said, and indeed, Ishizu now had twenty-two cards in her hand, brining Slifer to 22,000 attack points, and her life points up to 10,300. "There's just one thing, Ishizu. Since I've summoned yet a new monster, your Sky Dragon's special ability forces its second mouth to attack me again."

"It makes no different to me!" snarled Ishizu "Once your new monster is gone, nothing will stand in my way."

Her dragon attacked, and the blasted headed straight for my monster while I gazed at Ishizu and told her "Don't count on it, at least until you've seen what my new monster is."

The attacked collided and my new monster was revealed, much to Ishizu's shock. "What, another Spear Cretin?" It was the very one that I had earlier discarded, and re-summoned when my first one was destroyed. "I assume you know what happens now?" I asked.

"You're… going to summon its twin!" Ishizu said in shock, and indeed I did. She was also forced to summon the only remaining monster in her graveyard too, forcing her to draw yet another six cards. Then Slifer attacked my newly summoned facedown Spear Cretin allowing me to summon its twin, and Ishizu had to draw another three cards.

Marik had been watching his sister duel the entire time. "Ishizu, what's happening?" he asked with concern, but Ishizu stood where she was gazing in shock as my plan was succeeding. Every time I summoned a Spear Cretin, her Slifer would automatically attack it, and activate its ability letting me summon its twin in its place, and forcing Ishizu or rather Karina to draw another three cards. Then Slifer would attack again, I would re-summon, and cards were drawn.

"I cannot believe this!" cried Ishizu. "Each event triggers the next in a never-ending cycle. First attack… then summon… then draw! Attack… Summon… Draw!" Her life points would continue to soar, and her dragon would continue to grow stronger as she drew more cards with each cycle, but none of it matters anymore for she was ultimately trapped!

"Sister, there must be something you can do!" cried Marik. Ishizu thought and thought, but she ultimately realized "AAAHH! I can't stop it! There's nothing I can do!"

I was just going to continue to summon my monsters back and forth and force Ishizu to keep drawing and drawing! "Once you run out of cards to draw you will automatically lose this duel to me, Ishizu!"

Overcome with extreme shock and outrage, Katrina dropped the she was holding onto the ground as Ishizu cried out "No! This can't be happening!"

I sniggered softly at her and said "Like I said, no monster is without weakness, and no strategy is completely without flaw, and thanks to your carelessness I'm about to slip past your forces once again."

The cycle continued, and the spies and Sabrina cheered from the sidelines, while Ishizu could only watch helplessly. "I have no control over my Egyptian God Monster!" she cried "As long as Mykan continues on this cycle, my dragon will continue attack his monsters, Mykan will continue to summon them, and my mind slave will draw cards until… until…! NO!" Her deck was totally cleared out and the duel disk stood empty.

"Your deck is empty Ishizu. You have no more cards that you can draw." I said "That means I win! It's over!"

Slifer collapsed onto the field and vanished in a big cloud of smoke along with every other image on Ishizu's side of the field, and Karina fell to her knees in total shock and shame, while Ishizu herself was totally outraged. "No! This cannot be! How could I lose with an Egyptian God Card in my deck?! IT'S IMPOSSBILE!" Her angry shouts and her pounding her throne awoke baby Erica, and she cried and screamed.

Marik covered his ears, and while Ishizu attended to the baby, she warned me this was not over. "You may have defeated Slifer, but my brother and I hold another Egyptian God Card; a much more powerful one. You and your wife will be ours yet. Mykan…!"


	20. Short on Time

**CHAPTER TWENTY**

It took quite a while for Ishizu to calm the baby down, especially while she herself was in outrage. Not only had she just lost to me, but she lost one of the two Egyptian God Cards she and her brother went to great lengths to secure.

"Fear not, Ishizu. All is not lost." said Marik "We may have lost today, but as I have said I prepared a backup plan to cover our losses and give us another chance."

Ishizu remembered and felt slightly less miserable, but still; to be so close to obtaining victory and letting it slip away would take time for her to shake off. "Enjoy your victory while you can, Mykan. I'll have you as mine yet!"

Marik gripped his Millennium Rod tightly. "The finalists for the tournament will be decided at any moment. Mykan and his friends will be sure to be amongst them. What they don't realize is one of the finalists will duel on my behalf and send all their hopes plunging into darkness."

…

Never in my life had I been so happy that the duel was over. The skies had cleared and all was quiet. Ishizu's image had vanished, and Karina had passed out and was lying flat in the street unconscious.

The spies were ever so happy I won, and ever so relieved it was over, they dashed over to me and crashed into me in a big group hug and extending their congrats to me, only they were hugging me a little too tightly that I could hardly breathe "Girls, please!" I begged and they let me go. I nearly slinked to the ground but Sabrina caught me. "Are you alright?" she asked.

I gazed at me wife and smiled at her "Apart from that squeeze I've never felt better." Sabrina smiled at me lovingly and then I got back onto my feet and approached Karina's unconscious body. I gazed through every single one of her cards that lay on the ground until I found her Egyptian God Card which I had rightfully won through the ante rule, and strangely right underneath it was a keycard piece, the sixth and final piece that I needed.

"You did it, Mykan!" cried Alex "You got all six pieces."

"Awesome! Now you can come to the finals just like the rest of us." added Clover.

I nodded in agreement, and above other things I had gained one of the most powerful yet dangerous cards in all of Duel Monsters. "I better be careful with this, but I won't let anyone use it so shamefully again."

Mandy stood where she was, and she was pretty impressed that I was able to actually win the duel, but she had seen all that she came for and she now knew where Slifer was. She began to walk off. I looked up and saw her. "Mandy…!" I called to her. "Thank you, for giving me some of the confidence I needed."

Mandy didn't even smile "Whatever! Just enjoy that Egyptian God Card while you can. It won't be yours much longer."

"Hey!" snapped Alex "Mykan just said thank you, the least you could do is acknowledge that or say _"your welcome"_

Mandy scoffed "As if! Look I'm going to spell this out for you losers. I only entered this tournament for one reason and one only, and that's to kick your miserable butts!"

She went on and repeated her story of how she was sick and fed up of always losing to the girls, and how I humiliated her at Mali-U, but after receiving Obelisk the Tormentor, she felt she finally had what she needed to crush me and the girls for good, until she learned of the other two God Cards, and now she was aiming to get them for herself. "Thanks to you, Mykan, I've already learned all I need about Slifer the Sky Dragon, and now I know where the last card is. Soon, I'll have all three cards, an unbeatable deck, and you losers will be squashed while I get to be the world's greatest duelist."

All of us, especially me felt sickened hearing her say that, we tried to warn her about the real dangers and what the outcome of the tournament really meant, namely disaster or the whole world, Mandy didn't care as she didn't believe in magic and all this Millennium Items junk.

This really aggravated me, and I would have loved to show her how wrong she was, but with my Millennium Necklace still blocked out, I really couldn't.

"I'll see you at the finals, Mykan." Mandy said, and then she ran off back into the city, which led us all to realize it was getting late. We all had to head back to the city and register for the finals before anyone else did. "Wait!" cried Alex "I still don't have all my pieces."

In all the chaos and stress from my duel against Slifer, we all had completely forgotten. Plus, we couldn't leave poor Karina lying on the ground, but luckily an ambulance had come to take her and give her help, they didn't even question us as witnesses having seen this happening practically all over the city and scoffing at the tournament for causing this. So we were free to head back into the city. We needed to find Alex a new challenge and fast!

The big duel clock set up in the center of Duel City showed us there was only ninety minutes left before the finalists could sign up. Mandy had already registered, and that left only seven places left in the finals. "Look, forget me, you guys just go and sign yourselves in." said Alex.

"No! Not without you, Alex." I said.

"There has to be another challenge you can take." added Sabrina, but it was looking bleak. So many duelists had been eliminated thanks to duelists like Mandy who just faced them mercilessly and taking their keycard pieces, leaving very few left with the missing piece Alex needed.

Alex like pulling her hair out of her head in frustration, when suddenly we could all see a huge crowd of people huddled in one area, obviously watching a duel. We all made our way into the crowd and looked on just in time as a tall punk Duelist dressed in biker's outfit with a leather jacket with spikes and metal beads, and thick dark shades, defeated a duelist and mocked and ridiculed him relentlessly for his loss. "Come on, you lost, now fork over your cards!"

The loser, shamefully and shakily threw his cards down to where the duelist and his biker buddies, who were just as cruel and callous gathered the cards and taunted the poor duelist and even resorted to acting scary, even after all he had been through.

The bikers laughed wickedly and continued to pick up the cards, when suddenly the spies came in and stepped their feet right into their hands, pinning them down. "Hey! What's the big idea!" one of them snarled.

"Mover your stinkin' girl feet!" growled the other.

Clover felt badly insulted "Okay, no one goes insulting my grade-A pedicure like that." She and she readied herself to kick the two, when the punks, using their free hands flicked coins at her forehead, stunning her and flipped her and Sam off their feet.

"Girls!" cried Alex.

The crowds gasped and felt there was going to be a real fight soon, but the biker leader steeped forth snickering "Well, what have we got here, A band of pretty dweebs lookin' to get fixed?!"

The girls felt insulted again, but I stepped forth "Who are you?" I demanded to know.

"Well, if ain't the famous Mykan Jaden. You don't look as tough as you sound. I bet me and my chums can duel rings around your sorry butt."

I clenched my fists. "I asked for your name."

The leader snickered "Whoa, he's got a temper. Ease off big guy, the name's Matt-Mighty Metal Matt's what they all call me."

The spies recognized his name and had heard of him. He was a bully at Bev-Hills High, a real rebel without cause. He shamelessly picked on other students and poked fun at others, even during times of misfortune all because he wanted to laugh at people and felt he was always in the right and that the world should be more like him. He got expelled after a band of nerds exposed him and he had ever since been living life on the edge; all trouble, no shame, making a living of making people miserable.

"What can I say, it's a talent." he said with pride "Now I'm in this here tournament, and it looks like I'm the one who's going to the finals." He opened his leather jacket to reveal he had no less than twenty completed key pieces, much to everyone's complete shock and astonishment. His chums revealed they had just as many cards as well.

"That's impossible!" cried Sabrina "No one could have assembled that many pieces in one day."

"Well it looks like we did." hissed one of the chums.

"Nobody's goin' to the finals except for us." said the other.

"They're lying!" one of the spectators hollered "They stole my key pieces, and took my cards while I wasn't looking."

The punks' features hardened, but then more of the spectators said the exact same thing. Some even said they were challenged to duels by Matt, and were forced to put all their key pieces on the line.

"Yak, yak, yak…! Me and my chums didn't do nothin'." said Matt. He was secretly lying. He and his punks really did go around stealing other people's pieces in attempt to wipe out the competition so it would practically be a No-Contest and he could win the entire tournament with ease, but the people couldn't prove he and his punks really stole the pieces. Without proof, they couldn't do anything.

Alex couldn't bear to hear that creeps like these were roaming about and stepped forth with a look of fury in her eyes. "Whoa, boys; I think we got ourselves another challenger here." chuckled Matt

"You got that right!" said Alex "You bad boys need to be taught a lesson and I'm just the one to take you to school."

The three puns snickered wickedly and mocked at Alex. "You're a light weight, girly."

"Yeah, no one beats Mighty Metal Matt. We oughta just beat ya up right here."

Matt, however liked the idea of trashing one more duelist before the finals. "What's one more challenge, and what difference does it make." He walked forward a bit still leering at Alex "Hope you realize what you just stepped into you, ya twerp. When I'm finished with you, you'll just be another waste of space on this Earth."

Alex remained unfazed "Do your worst. I eat bozos like for breakfast."

Clover and Sam cheered her on, but everyone else felt that Alex was making a huge mistake, and others tried to persuade her not to go through with it, but Alex's mind was made up, she would crush this creep and his goons, and finish her keycard at the same time. "Just you guys watch me. I'll mop the floor with these punks." She turned to gaze at me and Sabrina, and I nodded at her and gave her a thumb up showing I had faith in her.

Alex and Matt stood with everyone else watching. They prepared their disks and scores. _"…DUEL!"_


	21. Metal Maniacs: Part 1

**CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE**

The scores were set…

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 8000 VS Alex: 8000_**

"Hope you're ready for a world of hurt, twerp!" mocked Matt.

"Bring it on." snapped Alex "You can't scare me that easy."

"Ha! We'll see about that." Matt said, he drew all his cards and went first. "One card facedown, and I'll throw this is attack mode, **_ANCIENT TOOL!"_**

**_(Atk: 1700)_**

It was a Machine type monster, hence why he was called Metal Matt. To him, machines were the absolute power over all of mankind and could easily crush it as well. "You won't find a better master of machines than me. Now make your move!"

Alex wanted to make a move, but unfortunately, none of the monsters she drew were strong enough to beat that Tool. So she decided to play it safe. "I'll also put one card facedown, and throw this monster in defense-mode."

"What's the matter, you afraid to come out and fight me?" teased Matt. Alex didn't bother to respond back while Matt drew his next card. "Let's see how you like this; the **_CARD TROOPER!"_**

**_(Atk: 400)_**

The crowd seemed worried at the sight of that monster, but Alex confused and scoffed "It's only got 400 attack points. You call that a monster?" but Matt snickered "Just you wait, twerp. The worst is about to come. See, my Trooper got a special ability that allows me to send the top three cards on my deck to the graveyard, and for each one that goes, his attack boosts up by 500 points."

Alex whimpered in shock as Card Trooper's attack instantly went up to 1900. "Now then, time to see what you're hidin' down there." said Matt, and he ordered his Card Trooper to attack, and Alex's facedown monster- **_LITTLE-WINGGAURD_**-was destroyed "Too bad for you, twerp, because now I'm goin' straight for your life points! Go Ancient Tool!"

"That's what you think!" snapped Alex "I play **_SCAPEGOAT!"_** It summoned four sheep tokens to help protect her, and so Matt had no choice but to destroy one of the four tokens leaving Alex with three left. "Too bad for you, punk, my life points are safe."

Matt growled, but remained unfazed while Sam and Clover cheered for Alex. Now it was her move. She drew her next card "Time to return a bit of the favor. I summon **_PANTHER WARRIOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 2000)_**

"But before he can attack, I need to sacrifice a monster. So I'll take one of my sheep token, and since your card trooper's attack has gone back to normal, Panther attack!" but as her monster lunged at the weak machine…

"Typical and idiotic move" scoffed Matt "…I activate **_NEGATE ATTACK!"_**

Alex growled as her attack was reduced to nothing. She had no choice now but to end her turn thinking she was in the clear. "I sure hope Alex knows what she's getting into." said Clover. "I think she just might…" added Sam "I think she and Matt were only testing each other out on those last moves. Now they look like they're about to get serious."

She was right, Matt was thinking silently _"This babe sure is tough, but I'll show her who the better guy around here is."_ He drew his next card, and liked what he drew. "Hope you're ready for some real metal power. First I'll lay one card facedown, and I activate the spell **_MACHINE DUPLICATION, _**and it lets take my Card Trooper, and turn it into three!"

"Whoa! As if one of them was already bad enough…" cried Alex.

Matt snickered "Oh, don't worry; you won't have to deal with all three. I'm sacrificing one of them and my Ancient Tool so I can summon this bad boy; **_LAUNCHER SPIDER!"_**

**_(Atk: 2200)_**

Alex shuddered as she really hated spiders, and even Clover felt freaked out. "I've only seen things like that in my nightmares!" she cried. Alex turned and snapped "You think you got it tough? That thing's even stronger than my Panther Warrior!"

"And your problems are only going to get worse, twerp." said Matt and he ordered his Spider to destroy Alex's Panther.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 8000 VS Alex: 7800_**

Then he destroyed her last two sheep tokens with his two Card Troopers and he didn't even have to power them up, leaving Alex wide open with nothing on the field. "Oh, boy, this isn't good!" she muttered, but at least Mat had run out of attacks to use, but that didn't seem to bother him. "You're all washed out, twerp." he taunted "On my next turn, me and my machines are gonna totally blast your world to smithereens!"

All the machines stared Alex down with their weapons all pointed straight at her, making her sweat a little. Matt's chums chuckled and offered their comments to his performance. _"Stay strong, Alex."_ I said in my mind _"I know you can find a way to get past those machines."_

Alex shut her eyes and placed her fingers over her next card hoping for something good, but she didn't exactly get what she was hoping for. Though it wasn't the best, she had to make do with what she had and try and soften the blow. "I'll throw one card facedown, and summon **_ALIGATOR SWORD_** in attack mode!"

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

She was hoping and practically praying in her mind _"Please work!"_ and then ordered her monster to attack a card trooper, and it worked!

**_(Atk: 1500) VS (Atk: 400)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 6900 VS Alex: 7800_**

"Well alright!" she cheered "That's one of them down!"

Matt grunted, but then grinned "You got lucky there, twerp, but I also get to draw one card because you destroyed my trooper."

Alex didn't care much about that having at least destroyed one of the machines, but Matt was getting really aggravated _"Keep smiling while you can, kid." _He thought angrily as he drew his next card and he liked what he got. "Let's see how your little gator likes this big move; one card facedown, and I'll use **_MYSTICAL SPACE TYPHOON!"_**

"What?!" snapped Alex

"Say bye-bye to your face-down card." Matt laughed at Alex's predicament, and Clover and Sam were both very worried that Alex had nothing to stop any attacks with.

"Aw, don't feel bad, twerp, it'll be all over soon enough! I activate the ability of my Card Trooper." he ditched another three cards from the top of his deck to power his Trooper to 1900 points again.

Alex couldn't believe the way he was just throwing his cards away like that. "What are you doing? You've thrown about a fifth of your deck away. Don't you even feel you could've used those cards?"

Matt just grunted "Chillax, they're just cards and nothing more."

Even I felt heart-struck to hear him say that, and the fact that he continued on to say that the only thing his cards were for was kicking other duelists and fast, and then when he was done with them, he could cast them aside like old socks. "Duelin's all about winnin' and showin' how tough you are, even if it means you'd have to give up your own cards to get what you want."

"That's just sick!" I suddenly snapped. Matt gazed over at me. "Never in my entire history have I heard such blasphemy and disregard of the game such as that. Cards aren't just about winning, they're about something much more important and that is honor, respect, and learning how to bond with your cards so that you may learn to use them wisely."

Sabrina placed her hand on my shoulder and smiled at me, and the spies agreed with me, but once again, Matt could only scoff "Yeah right, and just when I thought you couldn't be more pathetic!"

I could feel my patience beginning to slip.

"Seriously, you bond with cards like their people? What next, you still talk to your stuffed animals or plushies like their best friends? You people are just a bunch of sickos." All five of us and many in the crowd felt sickened by his words "Besides, one of the benefits of throwing cards away allows you to get 'em back easier. I activate this trap; **_SOUL RESURRECTION!"_**

It let him revive one normal monster in his graveyard to the field in defense-mode, and the monster he chose was strongly not a Machine but an ordinary **_ZOA._**

**_(Def: 1900)_**

The rest of us on the sidelines were really confused at why Max did that, for Zoa was much better off played in attack mode. Matt was up to something, and none of us liked it, especially Alex, but to Matt, this was exactly what he liked, watching people tremble in fear of him, but right now, he had other things to take care of. "Launcher Spider, crush that overgrown lizard! …Attack!"

**_(Atk: 2200) VS (Atk: 1500)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 6900 VS Alex: 7100_**

Alex quivered with fear as the Card Trooper then poised its huge laser-cannons at her, and Matt ordered the attack, and poor Alex got blasted hard off her feet and drained of 1900 points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 6900 VS Alex: 5200_**

Sabrina gasped softly with extreme worry. "ALEX!" Sam and Clover cried. "Oh, no…!" Even I was starting to feel worried.

Matt and his punks snickered as they saw Alex slowly get up onto her feet groaning "Whoa…! I don't think I can take another shot like that."

The punks laughed and teased her relentlessly. "Give it up, pee-wee!"

"No way you're gonna win now."

Alex didn't want to believe it, but it almost seemed certain, as she was able to see Max's plan of bringing back that Zoa monster and how he'd use it with his other monsters to wipe out the rest of her life points. Even if Alex could summon a monster it didn't seem very likely she'd make it out alive. That meant no keycard piece, no finals, and she wouldn't be able to help me and Sabrina or the whole world!

These things on the line helped her find her strength and she snapped upright, much to Matt's shock. "What do you think you're doing!" he sneered "I'll tell you what I'm not doing, and that's giving up!" snapped Alex. She turned to face me, and I nodded at her. She nodded back and thought silently _"Okay, I need a winner here. Come on…!"_ and she drew her card, and she considered her options with what she drew.

"What the heck are you waitin' for? Make your move already so I can crush ya!" snarled Matt. Alex scowled at him, but went ahead. "I'll place two cards face down, and I'll summon **_AXE RAIDER!"_**

**_(Atk: 1700)_**

"I'm not taking any more chance with you this time. This time you're going down." Alex then ordered her monster to destroy the last Card Trooper, and it worked!

**_(Atk: 1700) VS (Atk: 400)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 5600 VS Alex: 5200_**

"Big deal!" snapped Matt "I still get to draw one card, and besides I don't even need that little punk anymore. I already got all that I need to totally steamroll you flat!"

He drew his next card. "All right ya twerp, let's end this duel for good, and I'll start by activating this trap card; **_METALMORPH!"_**

Alex knew of that card, and watched as Zoa got covered in armor plates raising his attack and defense points by 300. She mockingly teased "Oh, I'm so scared."

"Oh, you will be…" hissed Matt "See, I've got a special monster I'd like to introduce ya to, and the only way to show you is to sacrifice my Zoa while he's all metaled up."

Alex felt that sick feelings churn her stomach as she saw Zoa vanish in a big wave of light, and he reappeared as a stronger and more violent version of himself. "Say howdy to the monster that's going to end your game; **_METALZOA!"_**

**_(Atk: 3000)_**

Alex didn't know whether to think if this new monster was either creepy or cool, but one thing was certain; she was in big trouble. "Here he comes, twerp, and he's going to crush your puny monster like a bug."

The huge monster began to stomp its way over towards Alex's monster. "If Alex loses her Axe Raider, she's had it!" cried Sam.

"I can't watch!" cried Clover as she ducked behind same.

"This is the end of the line for you, twerp." hissed Matt, and he ordered his monster to attack, when suddenly he fell right through the ground and into a hole. "Hey! What gives?"

"Ha! You fell right in my trap; **_CHASM OF SPIKES!"_**

Sam and Clover cheered for joy, but Matt couldn't believe it. He got so caught up in his gloating that he completely ignored Alex's two facedown cards. Now not only was Metalzoa destroyed, but one-quarter of his attack power came out of Matt's score.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 4850 VS Alex: 5200_**

"Well done, Alex!" I said to her "Now you're in control of this match."

Alex winked at me and turned back to face Matt, who was really looking steamed. "You may have gotten lucky there, but I still have one machine to work with. Go Launcher Spider!"

The spider launched its missiles. "Too bad you didn't have a backup trap for that one."

"Actually, I did!" hissed Alex.

"What?!" snarled Matt.

"Now I activate **_(SKULL DICE!)"_** At the activation of her card, a big red dice block appeared. "This card divides up your monster's attack depending on the number of die. The higher I roll, the weaker your monster gets." Of course the only possible way Alex was liable to lose was if she rolled a one, and when her dice rolled, she got "Two" which cut the attack of Matt's monster in half, leaving it with only 1100 attack points. "Ah, man!" groaned Matt. "Too bad, Matt..." Alex teased and she ordered her Axe Raider to counterattack, and the Launcher Spider was squashed!

**_(Atk: 1700) VS (Atk: 1100)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 4250 VS Alex: 5200_**

"Alright! Alex is back, baby!" she cheered with pride.

Clover and Sam cheered along with many of the other spectators, but Matt was growing angrier while his chums felt worried. "Hey, you think maybe this kid can actually beat Matt?"

"I don't know. I don't know anything you know either."

"SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU!" shouted Matt. The punks leapt as if they heard a lion roar at them, and Matt turned to face Alex. _"Look at her, standing at there with that stupid grin on her face." _he thought to himself _"She's lookin' like she's actually got this won. Well, I'll show her. She has no idea that my deck is full of all kinds of other machines that I can use to easily blow her to pieces!"_

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	22. Metal Maniacs: Part 2

**CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO**

This was really getting to be a tight match, but Alex seemed to be in the clear, and now with just under a-thousand life points separating their scores, it was anyone's game.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 4250 VS Alex: 5200_**

"I can hardly contain myself. This is so suspenseful." said Sabrina. She gripped my hand tightly, almost too tightly. "Yeah… I know how you feel." I said as I felt the pain go through me, and Sabrina loosened her grip. Clover and Sam quietly muttered under their breaths cheering for Alex not to give up.

Alex just concentrated hard on maintaining her cool. She had the lead, but the duel wasn't over yet, and Max, though behind just snickered as he glared at her "You may have some fight in you, twerp, but you really think your traps can keep bailing you out? You're gonna run out of 'em sooner or later, and I've already got plenty more machines revved up and totally ready to blow you to pieces. Then I'll head the finals and take out your other wimpy friends too."

Alex merely smirked and said "Yeah right, dream on, Matt."

Matt's face curled into a fierce scowl "What'd you just say?!"

"First off; you won't beat me, and even if you did, you wouldn't stand a chance against my pals in the finals, and you know why that is… it's because you're nothing but a selfish, dimwitted sleaze-ball who only cares about himself!"

Matt looked like he was ready to explode, usually when people dared to breathe one bad word about him, he broke them in half. "Oh, you are so gonna hurt for that!"

Alex remained unfazed "I can take on even your best machines, because I've got better reasons for being in this tournament." She didn't want to let it slip that the word was in danger, but nonetheless it was still Matt's turn. "I'll show you and your good reasons a thing or two." he summoned only one monster in facedown defense-mode and ended his turn.

"My turn…!" Alex said as she drew her card, and then ordered her Axe Raider to attack, and Matt's monster was a wimpy normal machine monster that was easily smashed to pieces. "Take that!"

Matt felt steam shooting through his ears. "Twit!" then he drew his next card and played it in defense mode as well.

Alex drew her next card. "I summon **_ROCKET WARRIOR!"_**

**_(Atk: 1500)_**

She ordered her Axe Raider to destroy Matt's monster, which she did, and then she attacked his life points directly with Rocket Warrior, hitting Matt hard and strengthening her lead.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 2750 VS Alex: 5200_**

"Wow! Alex is totally on fire there." said Clover.

Sam agreed, but she still didn't count Matt out. He looked as if he was waiting for something.

As for Matt, he was really in a tight place "I can't let this twit attack me anymore. I've gotta draw what I need now!" and he drew his next card and laughed maliciously when he was what it was. "Okay, twerp, playtime's over. Let's see how you like this. I play **_MONSTER REBORN, _**and I'll use it to bring back this; **_BARREL DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2600)_**

Alex felt many shivers crawl through body at once at the sight of the huge machine. "Where'd that big boy come from?" she cried, but only then realized it had obviously been sent to the graveyard because of the Card Troopers. "So, you still think ditching my cards is a bad thing twerp?" Matt mocked "Well now me and my new machine will show you, especially when I activate his special ability." That's when three holographic coins appeared on the field and all three of them flipped up in a toss, and two of the coins turned out Heads.

Matt snickered "Now you're Axe Raider's about to be blown to bits!" and just as he promised, Alex's monster got blasted to bits. "He's gone!" cried Alex.

"That's what my Barrel Dragon does…" said Matt "And don't forget, I still have his attack to use. So do it, Barrel, and blast that rocket to the stars!"

Alex couldn't watch as Barrel Dragon blasted her poor Rocket Warrior off the field.

**_(Atk: 2600) VS (Atk: 1500)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 2750 VS Alex: 4100_**

Now Alex was backed into the corner again with huge machine staring down at her. "What's the matter, twerp, too scared to duel no more?" Matt teased, which made Alex quickly snap out of it "As if! I'll find some way to blow down your overgrown metal lizard, just like I did all those other machines."

"You know, you shouldn't broadcast your strategies like that. It makes it easier to overcome them." said Matt, and he set one card facedown ending his turn.

Alex felt really stupid for blurting like that, and couldn't help but wonder if Matt's hidden card would help him like it did all the rest. She didn't know, but knew she couldn't just sit and do nothing. She drew her next card, it was Pot of Greed and she used it to draw two cards giving her four in her hand, and she drew her Time Wizard, and she remembered how it saved her last year when she fought the slime-ball, Julius. _"It's risky, but I've got to try and take out that big machine."_

"I summon **_TIME WIZARD!"_**

**_(Atk: 500)_**

Everyone, even Matt gawked in shock at the move Alex just made. "Whoa! Alex is really taking a risk this time." said Sam.

"UGH! As if I couldn't feel any more tensed from all this." cried Clover.

Sabrina and I knew how risky this move was, and all we could do was hope Alex would get what she needed. "Here goes…" she said "Go Time-Roulette!" and the tumbler began to spin, going faster and faster. The punks and Matt were desperately hoping for the spin to stop on a skull…!

The arrow began to slow down. "Come on!" cried Alex "Get there…!" it looked as if it would stop on the large white skull, but then quickly zipped over and stopped on the red time machine. "Ah, yeah…! Who's the girl now?" cheered Alex as her Time Wizard destroyed the Barrel Dragon instantly. "Well, what do you say now, Matt?"

Matt smirked wickedly and said "I think you're just stupid."

Alex was confused.

"You're totally dense. You may have beaten my dragon, but I can bring him back just like I did the first time, thanks to this trap card; **_CALL OF THE HAUNTED!"_**

Alex yelped nervously when she remembered what that card did, and Matt revived his Barrel Dragon right back to the field. "Uh, oh…!" cried Alex.

Sam and Clover held each other whimpering nervously for Alex. Sabrina held my hand tightly again, but this time I didn't mind it. All of us were really worried for Alex, "Just as you should be." Matt sneered "Then again, so would I if I were on the blasting side of the huge monster."

Alex had no choice but to end her turn and Matt drew his next card. "Now I'm activating my Barrel Dragon's special ability again." The coin toss was activated, and Matt got two heads again, much to Alex's horrors. "What can I say? Guess Lady Luck's got the hots for me." His monster blasted Alex's Time Wizard away leaving her wide open for a direct attack. "Oh, boy…!" she groaned.

"Oh, yeah!" hissed Matt and he ordered both his machine to attack, and Alex got blasted so hard onto the ground he clothes got a little dirty, and she had just gotten them too before the tournament, but her score fell badly.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 2750 VS Alex: 1500_**

She struggled harder than ever to get back up onto her feet. She felt more worried than hurt, and who wouldn't, what with her life points so incredibly low, and very little options to help her make any comebacks. Matt was laughing himself silly with joy and pride. "Man, the look on your face was when I blasted you was just priceless."

Alex managed to get up onto her knees, but this only amused Max more. "Yeah, just like everyone else; groveling at my knees like the miserable thing that you are and always will be."

All of us were more than sick and fed up of Matt's taunting. Clover even thought he was more annoying than Mandy. "Come on, Alex! Break him in half and wipe that smug off his face." she hollered.

"Keep dreamin' Blondie!" Matt scoffed at her, and Clover really got mad. "You… called me?!" she roared loudly as if she was breathing fire, and all of us had to hold her back to keep form lunging at him and getting into big trouble.

Alex gazed down at her hand of three cards, feeling it was still hopeless for her to blast that dragon out of her hands, even with her strongest monster of all. _"Ah! My Red Eyes Black Dragon wouldn't stand a chance against that metal monster." _She said in her mind, and then she drew her next card. "Huh…?" and realized maybe there was still a chance for her, but again, it was going to require a little luck. "I'll place one card facedown, and I'll summon this; **_RED EYES BLACK CHICK!"_**

**_(Atk: 800)_**

"But don't think I'm done there, I can use this little guy's special ability. All I have to do is send him to the graveyard, and now I can summon my personal favorite monster; **_RED EYES BLACK DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2400)_**

As amazed as Matt was by seeing how Alex was still trying, he was far from fazed "That dragon may be your most prized possession, twerp, but he's still no match for me and my dragon."

Alex clenched her fist and hoped that this was where the luck would shine on her. Matt drew his card and activated his Barrel Dragon's ability tossing the coins, and this time, all three coins landed as Tails "What?!" snapped Matt.

Alex wiped her brow and sighed heavily in relief. "Guess Lady Luck dropped the ball on you this time." she teased. Matt was outraged "I'll show you who's dropped what!" he growled "I can still blast that overgrown lizard of yours to kingdom come. Go Barrel Dragon, attack!"

Alex quickly made a move while the attack happened, and Barrel Dragon fired, and everyone shielded their eyes from the brightness. Matt laughed wickedly and taunted "Take that!" but then, much to his horror, his own dragon exploded, and he lost 100 life points.

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 2650 VS Alex: 1500_**

While Alex's Red Eyes remained unharmed. "But, that dragon should be blown to bits. This ain't right!"

"Oh, it's right…" said Alex "All thanks to my handy trap card. Look familiar…?"

Matt could hardly believe his eyes. Alex had a Metalmorph trap card of her own, and she used it to make her Red Eyes 300 attack points stronger; to 2700, causing Barrel Dragon to destroy his own self. "You… you tricked me!" growled Matt.

"You tricked your own self." Alex sneered "If you spent less time being a total puke-head then maybe you'd learn a thing or two; like not to underestimate your opponent!"

Matt's chums chattered away trying to express concern for their boss. "I said SHUT UP!" he roared. He needed time to think, but he couldn't leave himself defenseless, so he summoned a monster facedown and ended his turn.

Alex drew her next card. "I'll put one card facedown, and now I think I'll do exactly what you did way back then." She had studied and learned so much about the Red Eyes because it was her favorite, and she learned all the many different ways to use it including how to tribute it with Megamorph to summon a counterpart, just like Matt did. "Check it out, now my Red Eyes Black Dragon is a **_RED EYES BLACK METAL DRAGON!"_**

**_(Atk: 2800)_**

Her new dragon shined in the light of the sunset and growled majestically. Clover and Sam felt almost enamored at the sight of it. "I can see why Alex loves that dragon so much." said Sam. Clover only nodded, and they watched as Alex ordered her dragon to crush Matt's defense, leaving him wide open. "That was for calling Clover and Blondie!"

Matt growled so angrily, you'd think he was about to rip his cards to pieces. "You're gonna pay for that, ya twerp. No one makes a fool of Mighty Metal Matt and gets away with it!"

**_To Be Continued…!_**


	23. Metal Maniacs: Final Part

**CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE**

With Alex's Metal Red-Eyes still staring Matt down, Alex was confident she had the match in the bag.

But really, he was shaking, and felt there was only one way to win this duel now. He held his deck awkwardly as he drew his next card, and sneakily slipped a card from his under his sleeve into his hand and made it look like he drew it…

…but Sabrina and I saw that! "He's cheating!"she whispered to me. I felt my anger spiking. How low could someone go to disgrace the game like this? As much as anyone else would have pointed him out right away, Sabrina and I decided to hold back. This was not the first time we had seen anyone cheat like this, and if we were right, the there was nothing to fear… we hoped.

"Well, look what I just drew. It's my rarest card!"

Alex blinked once "Huh…? Um, didn't I just blast your rarest card to bits?"

"Yeah, keep dreamin' twerp." said Matt. "First off, I'm activating **_COST DOWN!"_**

"Cost Down? What's that do?" asked Alex. Matt snickered and explained that all he had to do was discard one card from his hand to the graveyard, and then he could shave two levels off of all the monsters in his hand. "Thanks to this, my six-star monster becomes a four-star monster, so I don't have to make any tributes to summon it, and here it comes; **_(JINZO!)"_**

**_(Atk: 2400)_**

Everyone in the crowd gasped at the sight of that monster. Some had even faced it before, and though it was weaker than Alex's Red Eyes, it did have one heck of a special ability. "You better hope that facedown you got there isn't a trap."

Alex watched as her facedown trap card got blasted to bits by Jinzo. "Hey! What gives?"

"That's what my Jinzo does, he makes it so trap cards can't be played, and he destroys any that we throw on the field."

Alex gasped "No way! I can't use my traps anymore?!"

"That's what I said." hissed Matt "Oh, and one other thing. True, I can't beat your Red Eyes with Jinzo the way he is, so I'm going to block it form attacking with this; **_PARALYZING POTION!"_**

Alex yelled in dismay as she saw her beloved dragon get covered in some green slimy goop, and he just froze up. "Thanks to the power of this super potion, your dragon can't attack me at all."

"You've got to be kidding me!" groaned Alex. She honestly didn't know how much more difficulties she could stand up to. "And you know what else, twerp, I'm gonna keep your dragon like that until I've powered up my Jinzo enough to wipe him out." He didn't mind blurting it out since he felt he couldn't lose.

"Yeah, well last I checked your hand was all empty." said Alex "And just because you have cards doesn't mean you'll draw them."

Matt was not worried about that at all, thanks to the many tricks up his sleeve, literally! For now, it was Alex's turn, and she was stuck once again, unable to attack or set any traps, and just the one card she was holding wasn't very helpful at the moment. She drew a card from her deck, and it didn't help her out either. "I'll pass. I can't do anything."

_"Well, I can do this." _Matt sneakily thought, and he awkwardly held his disk and slipped another card from his sleeve again. "Well, well… look what I just drew; **_MACHINE CONVERSION FACTORY!_** I think I'll use it to give Jinzo and extra 300 attack and defense points.

**_(Atk: 2400) – (Atk: 2700)_**

This was getting serious. All Matt needed now was one more powerful card and he could destroy Alex's dragon, and Alex still wasn't able to attack. Right now it was her turn, and she was carefully pondering over the cards in her hand trying to figure out how to win this. She drew her next card…!

"Huh?"

She thought hard.

"Come on, nothing you got will save you from Jinzo, just end your turn." snarled Matt. Alex merely placed the card she drew facedown without saying anything. Matt then proceeded to once again, slip a card from his sleeve. "Well, it's a **_7-COMPLETED!"_**

He played it instantly and raised his Jinzo's attack by another 700 points, raising him all the way up to 3200. Clover and Sam were freaking out. "His Jinzo's stronger than Alex's Red-Eyes." cried Clover.

"It's going to get crushed!" added Sam.

"Oh, Mykan…!" cried Sabrina. I was worried, but still was hoping Alex was ready for it.

"It's been fun, kid, but now it's all over for you." snarled Matt and he ordered Jinzo to fire on Alex's dragon, just as she quickly activated her other card. "Attack!" shouted Matt.

Jinzo attacked, and his power hit Alex's dragon with a big explosion. Alex whimpered nervously, along with the rest of us and all the spectators, and Matt's chums cheered for what looked like Matt's ultimate victory. "You're finished!" Matt shouted, but as the smoke cleared "What? No way…!"

There, standing next to Alex's dragon, was the images of a sneaky looking tailor; **_TAILOR OF THE FICKLE_** to be precise, and he was holding the 7-Completed card Matt had played. "Ha! You should've paid more attention to my last move, Matt." Alex sneered "Then you would've seen the neat little surprise I set for you."

The Tailor of the Fickle card was able to take equip-spell cards in play and then re-equip them to any other monster Alex chose. So she snatched the 7-Completed card and gave it to her Red-Eyes raising its attack to 3500, and weakening Jinzo severely. "And since my monster's attack is weaker than yours… then that means…!"

"Bingo! Your monster's history…!" said Alex, and in a blinding flash of light, Jinzo was vanquished.

**_(Atk: 3500) VS (Atk: 2700)_**

**_SCORE:_**

**_Matt: 1950 VS Alex: 1500_**

Matt couldn't believe this was happening. He had no cards left in play and none in his hand. Even his chums were nervous. Now it was Alex's turn. "My draw… and check it out, I just drew **_DE-SPELL! _**Now I can destroy that potion card and free my Red Eyes. Bet you know what happens now."

Alex ordered her Red-Eyes to deliver the final attack, winning the match!

**_FINAL-SCORE:_**

**_Matt: "0000" VS Alex: 1500_**

"No way…! She beat me! She actually won!" cried Matt, while everyone else cheered for joy, and Alex she leapt the biggest leap she had ever left before crying "HEY, ALL RIGHT…!"

The spies all huddled together in a big group hug and Sabrina and I joined them celebrating Alex's well-earned victory, while Matt and his chums were in all-out shock. "I can't believe it." cried one of the chums. "And after everything we went through and all the key pieces we stole."

Matt turned sharply "You idiot!" but everyone else heard what was said.

"He said stole!"

"I'll take that as a confession!"

Matt and his chums felt every eye in the crowd staring right at them and everyone was getting way angry. Matt felt shaky and quivered nervously, which made the cards in his sleeve spill out on the ground. Everyone gasped. "Hey! You were cheating!" snapped Alex.

"Yes, he was." I said, and I confessed that Sabrina and I saw it from the start, but we knew that Alex would be able to beat him even like that. "Cheaters never prosper, and when you disrespect and mistreat your cards, you pay a high price."

"Man, Matt! That is just way low!" Alex scolded. She angrily approached him, and he and his punks could see they had nowhere to run, with all the angry people surrounding them. "Look, take it easy. Have some mercy!" he whined.

"Mercy…?! As if…! Why should I give you something you've never shown anyone?" She forced him to hand over his Jinzo card and a piece of the keycard she needed to make hers complete. Then she told the spectators "He's all yours." And the punks were soon on the run from the angry mob, but they got caught and something us all Matt wouldn't forget this day ever, but apart from that, we had all done it. All our keycards were complete and there was still just enough time for us to register.

Next stop for us was the finals!

**_Author's Notes:_**

**_I'm putting this on HIATUS right now, I don't know how long for, but I need a break from it, and I got other projects in DESPERATE need of completion._**


End file.
